


TO DANCE AGAIN IN THE BULL COURT NEVER : an epilogue to A Mirror For Observers

by ivorygates



Series: A Mirror For Observers [3]
Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: F/M, curtainfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-03-03
Updated: 2007-03-03
Packaged: 2017-12-06 13:29:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 28,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/736222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ivorygates/pseuds/ivorygates
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happens after they come home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	TO DANCE AGAIN IN THE BULL COURT NEVER : an epilogue to A Mirror For Observers

EDORA, THE FUTURE:

The four of them walk back to the village together, walking slowly enough to accommodate Dani. Daniel shrugs into his shirt along the way. It's a shapeless smock that hangs halfway to his knees.

At one of the houses in the village, they stop and pick up what seems to be most of the rest of what they own -- or at least all of what they intend to take. A fringed leather coat for Daniel. It's seen some use. A heavy shawl for Dani -- she ties it shoulder to hip -- and a hat like Daniel's. A walking-stick for him.

Except for her glasses -- his could pass -- they look like Young Pioneers from two centuries ago.

They continue down to the Stargate.

O'Neill dials. Both Dani and Daniel hug Laira goodbye.

"Fair day, Laira," Daniel says.

"Come back when the baby is born," Laira says. "I want to see him -- or her."

"We hope to," Dani answers.

The wormhole establishes. They step through. They're holding hands.

#

"Chulak," Daniel says, looking around.

"Teal'c's having a party," O'Neill says.

Dani leans forward, clutching at her stomach.

"Baby always kicks when we Gate," she says breathlessly, catching O'Neill's alarmed expression. "He'll be fine." She takes a deep breath and sneezes violently. Swears. Fumbles in her apron pocket for a handkerchief.

"She," Daniel says. They've probably been arguing about that for months. He's already sounding fairly congested himself. Allergies and no medication. O'Neill had forgotten how bad Daniel's allergies were, before Frasier had put him on regular shots.

Which he certainly hasn't been getting lately.

Dani straightens, tucks the handkerchief away again, glances toward the city, sighs slightly. It's a two mile walk.

"You good for this?" O'Neill asks. It's not like they can call a taxi.

"Baby isn't due for another couple of months," she says.

"Another month," Daniel says.

"Two," she repeats.

"One," Daniel insists.

"Whose baby is this, anyway?" she demands, sounding faintly irritable.

"Well… mine," Daniel says, sounding smug. Yes, smug is the word.

She ignores him and walks -- carefully -- down the steps, using the staff-weapon for balance. It's colder on Chulak than it is on Edora. She stops at the bottom to re-tie her shawl.

Fortunately for O'Neill's nerves -- he doesn't care whether it's one month or two, she looks like she's going to have that kid _right now_ \-- they meet a cart heading into the city and hitch a ride. Daniel and Dani chatter cheerfully along with the driver in Jaffaese. Apparently the language contains words for more things than 'shoot the _Tau'ri_ and enslave their planet.'

The cart seems to be full of bags of potatoes. Or turnips. Or something lumpy.

"So… Jack. What happens back on Earth?" Daniel asks. Dani seems to be completely engrossed in the conversation with the driver.

"You guys go home. Some of it depends on General Hunnicutt. She might ask you to come back to work at the SGC, if you're interested. Other than that, I really think you ought to think about getting married."

"We _are_ married."

"Earth-style."

#

The driver drops them off at the edge of town. It's only a few short streets to Master Bra'tac's house. It's dusk by now.

Daniel lifts her down from the cart.

"Daniel, why are we here?" she whispers against his neck.

"Well, apparently this is where Jack was supposed to be all day. Sam and Teal'c are here. So we're all going to go back from here together in a few hours."

She doesn't ask if it's going to be all right. She trusts this Jack as much as she trusts -- trusted -- her own. He would not have taken them off Edora if it wasn't going to be all right. He would have let them run again.

But they're going back to Earth, and that's going to be just …weird. What will they do in the real world, away from the SGC? It's going to be hard to re-establish their academic credentials after all this time. Hard for each of them, in different ways. She wonders if the Air Force will help.

Jack leads them into Master Bra'tac's house. It's decorated for a party, filled with people. She sees Teal'c, recognizes Rya'c and Kar'yn.

Kar'yn is holding a baby.

Reflexively, she racks her staff weapon by the door -- there are others there -- and glances at Daniel and Jack.

"It's a party," Jack tells them. "Mingle." He moves away.

Daniel takes his hat and hers and hangs them on a cloak-peg beside the door, sets his walking stick beside the staff weapons -- it looks a little odd there -- and puts an arm around her waist. What she has left of one, anyway.

"Okay?" he asks.

"A little tired. Let's go see the baby."

They make their way across the room. Kar'yn's glowing. The baby seems to be only a few days old.

So small.

The one still inside her is smaller still. A boy, no matter what Daniel thinks. She's sure of it.

They're going to name him Jonathan.

Called Jack.

Jack -- well, Jonathan -- Jackson? Better come up with a middle name quick. Since they're going back to Earth, where patronymics are used.

She's not giving up the name, though.

They greet Kar'yn, congratulate her upon a child born to freedom. She doesn't recognize them at first. Doesn't recognize Dani at all, actually, since she's never met her. But she knows Daniel, and is delighted to find he's taken a wife.

"A wife will make you a strong warrior," she tells him firmly. "Rya'c! Come and see Daniel Jackson's wife!"

Rya'c arrives, and he's got Teal'c with him.

"Daniel Jackson has taken a wife," Kar'yn repeats, sounding as if she's arranged it herself.

"So I observe," Teal'c says.

He's actually grinning.

She wasn't sure he could do that.

"Hey, Teal'c," Daniel says. "You're a grandfather."

"And you are soon to be a father, Daniel Jackson. Rya'c, a chair for the _ahava'ta_."

The Jaffa word means 'life-bearer.'

There's no equivalent word in the _Goa'uld_ language.

Rya'c comes back with a chair. More of a stool, really, but she can get the weight off her feet. Her back hurts most of the time these days. One more mark on the side of the board indicating that Men Have All The Breaks. She sits down with a grateful sigh.

Kar'yn lets her hold the baby.

It's a boy.

His skin is so soft.

She balances him on the curve of her belly. Baby Jack is quiet at the moment. Gating tires him out, and he always sleeps soundly for hours afterward, but he's been doing it from the time he was conceived, and it's too late now to worry about the side effects.

She hopes he's fine and healthy. Soon they'll be back in a place where they can know for sure.

She isn't sure how she feels about that.

Daniel and Teal'c are talking. She's just a little too tired to follow the conversation. Galactic politics, events at the SGC over the last three years. Things that haven't mattered to them for a long time, but might matter to them again soon.

Hard to see how. Even with a pardon.

_Play for time and never assume._

_Yes, Jack._

The baby begins to fuss and Kar'yn takes him back, saying she's going to go and lay him down.

Rya'c follows her.

"Are you well, Danielle Jackson?" Teal'c asks her.

She looks up. It's a long way up, from a sitting position.

"Oh, well, you know. Sort of …pregnant."

Teal'c smiles.

"Soon you will go home, where you may rest comfortably."

"You know, everybody's been saying that all day. But, T., for the last three years, I've _been_ home." Where Daniel is, is home.

Teal'c raises an eyebrow, and simply looks composed, as if he's already won an argument she can't remember starting.

Daniel brings her a cup of, well, something. Some kind of fruit juice of course, because the Jaffa don't drink alcohol.

"Hey, I think I see Sam," he says, as she takes it.

"Go. Mingle."

Sam's going to have kittens.

But apparently she's already had them -- or decided not to -- by the time she arrives, because all she does is hug Dani, bending down to do it.

"I'm so glad to see _both_ of you," she says.

Meaning, Dani's guessing, her and Daniel.

"This Hunnicutt treating you okay?" Dani asks.

"She's great," Sam says. "Nice to have a woman in charge for a change. Brightman's gone, too. The new Chief Medical's name is Lam. You'll like her. She's a lot like Janet."

"Another woman?" Dani asks. Lam makes three in a row. "What is it with these guys?"

"Apparently they feel the SGC Medical requires a woman's touch," Sam answers cheerfully.

Sam kneels beside her chair. They talk. Jack has been doing fine in Washington. This surprises Dani, though she knows it shouldn't. Jack can do anything he sets his mind to.

Sam's in command of SG-1.

"Took you long enough," Dani grumbles.

Sam laughs. "Had to wait until I made full Colonel," she says. "It was worth the wait. So… what about you two?"

"Ran around the universe. Played Zorro. Unseated some petty tyrants. About the usual."

"And the Furlings?"

"Got rid of them, too. For a really long time."

"Well, General Hunnicutt's going to want to hear all about that."

Dani sighs. "You guys sure about that pardon?"

Sam pats her on the arm. "You've got friends in high places. It's going to be fine."

#

There's a cart -- something kind of like a rickshaw, really -- waiting for her when it's time to leave, so she doesn't have to walk back to the Chulak Gate. Daniel pulls it. She leaves her staff weapon behind, although abandoning it makes her feel oddly unfinished.

They're going back to Earth.

"Will you be going back to Washington immediately, sir?" Carter asks, as they start down the road.

"No, I'll be staying at the SGC for a couple of days. Wouldn't miss this for the world."

The debriefing, Jack means. Her final debriefing.

"Probably a good idea," Daniel says.

"Daniel? Is there something you're not telling me?"

"Hm? Oh, no, Jack. I always tell you everything."

Jack makes a sound of derision.

The rocking motion of the cart lulls her to sleep.

#

"Wake up, sleepyhead, we're here," Daniel says.

It's dark.

There are torches lining the sides of the Gate. Even with freedom, it will be a long time before Chulak is an industrialized planet.

She climbs down from the rickshaw. Sam steadies her while Daniel dials the Gate. An address they thought they'd never be needing again. Earth.

The wormhole opens. Stabilizes.

Sam punches numbers into her GDO.

"She won't be expecting us," Dani says, in sudden alarm.

"I talked to her earlier," Jack says. "She's expecting you."

They step through.

#

CHEYENNE MOUNTAIN, 2009:

The bright glare of artificial light -- after so many years of lamplight and candle light -- hurts her eyes. Then Baby Jack makes his displeasure felt at being woken up so abruptly, kicking and thrashing like a trout on a line. Daniel's used to this by now. He takes her arm and steadies her, helping her down the ramp. She blinks back allergy-fed tears and rubs at her nose, which itches madly. She's hardly a prepossessing sight, if anybody was expecting a linguistic genius. She must look like a raccoon by now.

There's a woman at the bottom of the ramp. She must have been blonde as a child. In her late fifties, perhaps. Two stars.

"Welcome back to the SGC, Dr. Jackson, Dr. Jackson."

Northern California. Another language as a child, but she doesn't speak it now. Something Asian. She realizes that General Hunnicutt hasn't just called her 'Dr. Jackson' because she's Daniel's double…

But because she's Daniel's wife.

She sneezes violently.

"Allergies," Jack says in explanation. "Really bad allergies."

"Oh my god," Daniel groans feelingly. He sounds like he has the world's worst head cold. Three worlds in one day is two and a half worlds too many for either of them.

"Infirmary," General Hunnicutt says briskly. "I assume you know the way?"

#

Dr. Lam -- her first name's Carolyn -- is very nice. Pregnancy -- especially advanced pregnancy -- is not something the SGC infirmary ever expected to handle, but it's certainly equipped to do so. She does a full examination, then a sonogram. Asks a number of questions to which Dani doesn't know the answers.

No, she hasn't had a single medical examination while she's been pregnant. Yes, she's gone through the Gate constantly while she's been pregnant. Yes, the fact that she's been able to _get_ pregnant is because advanced aliens meddled with her and replaced -- recreated -- some of her reproductive organs. No, she's not _absolutely_ certain how far along she is.

She's delivered a number of babies. Helped with pregnancies on Abydos. But that was a long time ago. This is different.

"Well, the baby certainly looks healthy. Between seven and eight months, I'd guess, since you're not sure of the incept date. First babies usually take their time showing up, though. I can tell you the sex, if you'd like."

"Girl," Daniel calls, from the other side of the curtain. He sounds much better now. They've given him the allergy shots. Dr. Lam is waiting for her bloodwork to come back before letting Dani have any medication, though she's already gotten a full line of vitamins. Ouch. She's also gone through an entire box of Kleenex.

"Boy," she calls back.

"Do you want to know?" Dr. Lam asks.

"We'll wait," Dani says. "But I'm right."

She's finally allowed to head for the showers. Daniel's already out, showered and dressed. It looks odd to see him in BDUs again. Glasses are still broken, though. She showers.

Soap. Unlimited clean hot water. _Shampoo._ She can wash her hair and get it really clean.

The Air Force doesn't run to maternity clothes (at least on frontline bases). The only thing they can find to go around her on short notice is a flightsuit that's far too big in every place but one, but it's clean and new. She rolls up the sleeves and the cuffs and comes padding out of the changing room in her unlaced -- new -- boots, because there's no way in hell she can get down there to tie them.

"Laugh at me and I'll kill you," she says simply.

Daniel kneels to fasten her boots.

She waddles -- and that really is the word, these days -- back into the infirmary, where Dr. Lam finally, mercifully, provides her with the shots for her non-specific rhinitis. Her head begins to clear almost immediately, and her eyes stop swelling and itching.

"I think we can find you something a little more, er, flattering to wear by tomorrow, Dr. Jackson," Dr. Lam says tactfully.

_I look like a giant pickle._

"And Dr. Jackson, your new glasses should be ready by then."

"Great," Daniel says.

#

She's combing out her hair in their assigned quarters, trying to get it to dry faster, when he comes back from the commissary with a tray. He could have sent an airman for it, but she supposes he wanted to look around.

She _really_ needs to get her hair cut. It's halfway to her waist.

"My office's gone -- no surprise--" he says, setting the tray down and closing the door. "So's yours. And -- I suppose our house is too."

"So we're homeless." She pads over to the tray. She got her boots off again, through a startling feat of gymnastics. Her feet are swelling. And Baby Jack really hasn't settled down yet. There's coffee. She reaches for it automatically. Daniel smacks her hand.

"Not for you, little mother."

She sighs, and takes the glass of milk instead.

"You'll be awake all night," she tells him with a certain amount of malicious satisfaction, as he picks up the cup. There's ice cream. The sandwiches can wait.

#

_Tau'ri_ food is …strange. Teal'c never complained, when he first came, but she knew he thought so. Now she understands. Everything's too cold or too hot, too sweet, too salty, or too intense. It doesn't taste like the food she's become used to. The bread has no substance.

But it's filling and they've both eaten lots worse in the last few years.

The chocolate is still perfect: bitter, sweet, and addictive. The cacao bean grows on very few worlds, and chocolate doesn't taste the same from anywhere else. After she's eaten, she gets into bed. Just as she'd predicted, Daniel isn't ready to sleep.

There's a library on the Base.

Books to read.

He hesitates. She waves at the door. _Go._

#

People who knew them, she ruminates, snuggling down into the covers, would probably be surprised at how little they actually talk to each other most of the time. But there's really no need. They _know_ each other. They don't need words to communicate. Neither did she and Jack.

It's an old pain. It's never going to go away. After three years, those wounds are as healed as they're ever going to be, she suspects. That the memory of Jack is an abrupt and immediate presence in her mind and heart tonight is not a consequence of seeing Other Jack today, but of being back in the SGC. It doesn't matter if there's a new commander here. It doesn't matter if Jack is dead, and whether his counterpart is here or far away. For her, he will always be here, within these walls, where she first saw him.

Where he first saw her.

The hormones of pregnancy keep her emotions volatile and close to the surface these days. Her eyes well up with easy tears.

_What do I do, Jack?_

_Take care of the kid, Indy._

Her baby. Daniel's baby. In a way, Jack's baby, too, the one the two of them never got to have. Could never have had.

She wraps an arm over her swollen belly, and relaxes into sleep. Sometime later she awakens, realizing Daniel's joined her in the bed. His hand is over hers, over the baby.

#

In the morning she wakes late. It's a luxury sleeping in a bed. Indoors. In a safe place, neither too warm or too cold, protected from the elements.

For a few moments, at the edge of consciousness, she thinks she's back on Edora. They took a gamble, going there, but -- among many other things -- they needed a safe place for her to have the baby, somewhere they could stay for a while.

But she isn't on Edora.

Realizing that brings her awake with a jolt.

Daniel's sitting at the desk in the corner, working at a laptop. His glasses have been mended. No, replaced. His hair's shorter again, and his face is smooth. He'd been barbered on Edora, of course, but the technology for that's so much better here.

She pulls herself up to a sitting position, reaches for the robe spread out across the foot of the bed. Hard to believe, now, she ever passed as a boy. From her admittedly limited experience of pregnancy and its aftermath, she's pretty sure she won't ever be able to do that again, even after Baby Jack is born.

"You're awake."

"'Time's it?" she asks, heading for the bathroom. No sun here to tell time by.

"Eleven-hundred. There's a briefing called for 1500. I'm just getting our notes together now."

When she comes back from the bathroom he brushes, then combs, her hair. She used to do this for Sha're on Abydos, on the Women's Side.

She knows he did it for his Sha're as well.

His first wife.

When it's hanging tangle-free down her back, he braids it into a single long braid. then ties it off with something she hasn't seen in a long time: a fabric-covered rubber band, meant for securing long hair.

"There are some hair pins. Other stuff. Sam dropped off some things she thought you'd need before she went offworld. Earlier."

She walks over to the dresser. Sam has indeed been busy.

Hairpins. Makeup. Sam knows her shades. She picks up the packet of hairpins, pulls a couple free. Coils the braid around itself at the top of her head and pins it. Shakes her head experimentally. The bun holds firm.

"You're not going to cut it, are you?" Daniel asks.

She'd actually been planning to cut it as soon as she could arrange it. But he sounds …wistful.

"Maybe not."

There are clothes, too -- better clothes, although she's still no fashion plate. Two pair of blue maternity pants. The color's fairly close to the Air Force Blue BDUs. She'll be out of uniform, but that's not her problem. Some …large… black t-shirts. A blue BDU jacket, with the SGC patch. Buttoning it will be a lost cause, though. Still … uniform? (Well, it _is_ true that technically she's never resigned.) Other t-shirts -- all huge -- a few pairs of sweatpants -- they look like they'll fit, actually, at both leg and waist, which surprises her. Underwear.

She dresses, and regards the result in the mirror. Pregnant and uniforms simply don't mix.

She adds quick makeup and admires the result.

"Lunch?"

She's _starving._

#

Nothing has changed after three years away, and everything has. To coin a cliché. New faces at the tables in the commissary. New faces behind familiar insignia.

Daniel loads one tray for both of them, and they find a table.

Friends make eye-contact and nod in passing, but nobody stops. Tact? Or self-preservation? Anybody who knows her knows that she's AWOL. Or was. And Daniel, too. That has to be officially resolved.

"Good afternoon, kids. Everyone treating you okay?"

Jack stops. Leans over their table.

"Sure," Daniel says, sounding slightly surprised.

Outlawry hasn't changed his essential nature. In many ways they're different. He's always expected the best -- from people, from situations. She's always feared the worst. He sees no reason that everything should not be fine now. He trusts Jack.

Well, she trusts Jack, too. But something can always go wrong. Jack glances at her. She shrugs minutely, smiles. _Things could be worse._

"See you at the briefing, then."

#

"I talked to Jack last night," Daniel says, as they're walking back to A3. "He says we can use his place here for a few months, since he's in Washington."

Live at Jack's place. At least it will be a roof over their heads. "M'm. And?" That's probably not all they talked about.

"He thinks General Hunnicutt's definitely going to want us back. To work at the SGC."

She thinks of Daniel going through the Gate. A third of the missions the SGC undertakes are simple and easy. Another third are tricky. Well, they've always been able to handle those. The last third are dangerous disasters from the first step through the Gate. She knows there are a lot of married men on the Gate teams. She won't make up Daniel's mind for him. Or try to.

But she hates the thought of it.

They go inside their room. She reclines on the bed, rubbing her back and wincing. Daniel kneels on the bed to unlace her boots, continuing to talk.

"A lot's changed in the last few years. Apparently Ba'al escaped that big mess at Dakara, and is hiding out here on Earth, rebuilding his power base. The Jaffa Free State is wild to capture him. They've been sending operatives here -- secretly, in ships."

Because it sure wouldn't be very secret if they used the Gate, now, would it?

"Doesn't our treaty with them forbid that?" She isn't sure. It wasn't finished by the time she …left, and they'd never negotiated one like it on The Other Side.

"Ye-e-e-sss…" Daniel draws out the word. "But they're kind of …ignoring the treaty provisions. Which isn't really good for national security."

"Jaffa running around on Earth? No. _Ba'al_ running around on Earth, even worse. So where is he?"

"They're looking for him," Daniel says, with a sigh that says far more than words. They're looking and not finding, and it's been years. He lifts one of her feet onto his thighs and begins to rub it. She closes her eyes and wiggles her toes, sighing happily. She can't remember a time when her feet didn't hurt, any more.

"'They' would have to be the NID, because the SGC's mandate doesn't run on-world outside The Mountain," she says, half-dreamily. "Which means they're going to bag and tag a couple of those Jaffa hunters soon enough, and refuse to give them back. Which means good-bye treaty. Which means the Jaffa will be butting heads with the __Tok'ra__ pretty soon, too."

Daniel takes up the other foot. "And that means the __Tok'ra__ will cut off their supply of _tretonin_. Which means the Jaffa will need to return to symbiotes to survive."

"Assuming there are any out there."

"Well, most of the _Goa'uld_ seem to have been wiped out, and a lot of their holdings were overrun and destroyed by Replicators, but a few of the prim'ta might have survived. And if there's even one Queen among them…"

"We'll have it all to do over again," she says.

No one knows very much for sure about _Goa'uld_ reproduction. They're pretty sure that most of the 'adult' _Goa'uld_ , from System Lords down to the lowliest underlings, are now dead -- they killed a few themselves in the last few years -- and that any prim'ta left behind in _Goa'uld_ incubators are probably dead as well, without the Jaffa priesthood to tend them. The Free Jaffa have all renounced their immature _Goa'uld_ in favor of _tretonin_ , for which they're dependent upon the _Tok'ra_.

So the _Goa'uld_ are gone. Or mostly so. And without _Goa'uld_ Queens to replenish their numbers, They'll never be able to regain their stranglehold over the Galaxy. The _Tok'ra_ will hunt the rest of them down over the next few centuries, no matter where they hide.

But prim'ta, and even mature _Goa'uld_ , can be hidden away in stasis containers. Undoubtedly, several such caches of _Goa'uld_ exist. It's the way to bet, anyway.

If even one of them contains a _Goa'uld_ Queen…

Not their problem?

She'd like to convince herself.

She tucks her feet up. Daniel goes to get his laptop.

"The Jaffa can't be allowed to go back to symbiotes. But they can't remain dependent on the _Tok'ra_ for _tretonin_ , either. We've got to do something about that," he says.

"Us," she says dubiously.

He gives her a shy apologetic smile. _Yes, us._ But meddling would be no different than what they've been doing for the last three years. Jack trained them both well. They can't see trouble and _not_ help any more than they can, well, unmake this baby.

"If Dakara can be industrialized into a production center…" she says slowly. "Sam will know. And we have to find some way to convince the _Tok'ra_ to hand over the production technology and formula so the Jaffa aren't dependent on outsiders." Unfortunately, the _Tok'ra_ she has -- had -- clout with aren't the ones here.

Daniel opens his laptop, opens the page he was working on. She peers over his shoulder. They have a debriefing in a couple of hours. They need to get ready.

Other problems will have to wait.

#

It's odd to be sitting around this table again. There's a recorder in the center. General Hunnicutt's sitting at the head of the table. Jack sits across from them. General Hunnicutt has a number of briefing books piled up in front of her.

They have their notes.

"When Jack told me you were coming back, I got out your files and did a little reading," General Hunnicutt says. "Pretty amazing careers, both of you."

"Well…" Daniel says, embarrassed.

Dani says nothing. She's still not sure where this is going. Maybe not punishment. But certainly a scolding?

"Just for the record -- the official record -- Doctors, there are no charges pending against either one of you. And no matter what you tell me here today, no further charges will be filed. Are we clear on that?"

 _" <Does she understand the Furlings aren't coming back?>"_ Dani asks Daniel, in a language she's pretty sure nobody else here at the table knows.

 _" <I don't know,>"_ he answers in the same tongue. He takes her hand beneath the table. There's no way -- no where -- they can run if this goes wrong, and they both know it.

General Hunnicutt pretends she doesn't hear.

"Meanwhile, I'd like to get your final report. On tape, if that's all right."

"Yes," Dani says. "Of course. Where shall I begin?"

For a moment she's afraid General Hunnicutt will ask her to start at the beginning, and she really isn't sure where that is any more. But the General only asks for a general overview and analysis of the Furling situation at the time of the negotiations on PHX-1138 three years ago. With Daniel's help, she can reconstruct that.

Jack was head of the SGC when the Furlings came. He helps too.

"I knew they wanted to talk to me specifically." She hesitates, wondering how to get from there to the part about running away.

"General Landry wasn't going to let her go back to PHX-1138 on the forty-first day," Daniel says flatly. "He thought I could handle the treaty negotiations and a gift exchange. He was wrong."

Well, that takes care of that.

"So Jack accidentally took me through the Stargate, and I ran away."

"Dr. Jackson, I can't believe General O'Neill took you through the Stargate 'accidentally,'" General Hunnicutt says gently.

"Well, not accidentally," she admits, staring down at the table. "He took me because Daniel was busy and he needed a guide to … oh, I forget the name of the planet now."

"PNY-478," Jack supplies, glancing down at the briefing book in front of him. She wonders what's in it.

"Did they ever figure out how to play that game there?" she asks wistfully.

"Probably not a big priority," Jack points out.

"To continue?" General Hunnicut says.

She gathers her thoughts again.

"He took me to PNY-478 to translate the writing on the arena. But he didn't know what I was going to do," she tells General Hunnicutt. "How could he? I hadn't even seen Jack since his going-away party."

This is the absolute truth.

Daniel has told her since then, of course, that he went to see Jack in Washington. What he said. What Jack didn't say. But _she_ never saw Jack, nor spoke to him.

_'She has woven well, and all truth.'_

"So I …ran. I know a lot of Gate addresses. I kept moving. I had enough time to think about what to do. I knew I had something the Furlings wanted. I just had to figure out how to trade it for what _I_ wanted, which was for them to go away forever without giving us anything."

"And you feel you were qualified to make that choice on behalf of Earth?" General Hunnicutt asks, her voice neutral. Dani looks up and meets her eyes.

"Yes. I do."

"Well you must have succeeded, because we haven't seen anything of the Furlings since. We know you went back to PHX-1138 on the day the Furlings came back to negotiate. Can you tell us what happened that day?"

Dani explains. It's a long explanation -- what they wanted, and what she gave them -- with digressions into Irish and Welsh verse forms and Bardic triads, and she has to get up and walk around a couple of times to ease cramping in her back. But she gets all the way through it, with help from Daniel. She's not really sure how much sense it makes to the General. So much of it is theory, guesses, hopes. The only proof there is of it is that the Furlings themselves accepted her truths.

And the bargains she made.

"So they'll be back. But not for a hundred thousand years. We should be ready for them then," she finishes.

"And you told them they had to… 'learn to love?'" Hunnicutt sounds faintly incredulous.

"'Way too much _Star Trek_ ," Jack says, sounding amused.

He's the one who made her watch it.

Well, her Jack did.

"Traditionally, the Fair Folk have no hearts. That's supposedly why they meddle with humans in the way they do. I had to ask Raven for _something_ , under the terms we'd set. And I hoped that, well, if I asked for that, it might change them to the point they might never come back at all. Or that when they do, they might be more… compassionate," Dani says.

"And Coyote's gift? Something we have to worry about?"

"No. I could never… have children. It's in my medical file. He changed that. That was his gift."

"I see," General Hunnicutt says. She switches off the recorder. "I think that covers everything. Thank you, Doctors. For the immediate future, I don't see any reason you need to remain on the Base if you don't want to, since Jack tells me you have a place to go in Colorado Springs. Just remember you're both still employed by the SGC."

Dani looks at Daniel. Neither of them really expected this. Expected to be asked. Invited, maybe. Not _told._

"I, ah, resigned," Daniel says slowly. Dani simply stares at the General. She didn't exactly resign, but running off should count for something, shouldn't it? Like getting fired?

They've been gone for _three years._

"Well, I don't believe either of you filed the proper paperwork," General Hunnicutt says, smiling. "And I wouldn't be in a hurry to do it, if I were you. The medical benefits here are excellent. And you're going to need them." The General gets to her feet. "Dismissed."

#

"I feel like I've just been drafted," Daniel comments.

They're walking back to their A3 quarters.

"She can't be serious," Dani says tentatively.

Daniel shakes his head. He's not sure. "We _could_ resign."

"I can't imagine why she'd want to keep us."

#

When they arrive at their quarters, there are some storage boxes there. She levers herself onto the bed and lets Daniel open them. Her back hurts, and Baby Jack is awake and kicking, making it a little hard to breathe.

Another month -- or two -- of this? She's going to lose her mind.

Daniel holds up the boxes' contents for her to see. It's a merciful distraction. Personal possessions. The civilian clothes she wore the last day coming into The Mountain. His wallet and real-world ID. Her purse. A few personal items from their offices. Pictures, mostly. One of Sha're.

She's glad that survived.

"Driver's license has expired," Daniel notes, brandishing it. "And I'll need to renew my passport."

"Tell Special Documents," she suggests. If they've been drafted, they might as well take advantage of it. She regards her civilian boots. No way will they go on now. As for the rest of her clothes… well, maybe someday. And Daniel wore his civilian clothes through the Gate that day, so he doesn't even have those.

He brings her purse to her before returning to the boxes. She flips through her ID. All of it says 'Dana Ballard.' Who is she now? Dana Ballard? Dana Jackson? Dana Ballard-Jackson? Dani?

Who?

"Daniel?" she says hesitantly.

"Hm?" He's still looking through the boxes. She wonders who packed them and sent them to storage. Sam? Probably. She wonders what happened to all their books. Suddenly it matters again.

"Should we get …married?"

He looks up. Comes over to the bed and kneels beside her.

"We _are_ married."

Yes. In every way that matters, but one.

"Not here."

"I'll talk to Special Documents. They can take care of it. Backdate the documents."

"That would be good." It will matter for Baby Jack's sake.

It's not the big cake and the long white dress, but that was never what she wanted. She thinks of Abydos, the torches and music and feasting that would go on for days, the bathing and oiling of the bride and groom, being led to her husband's bed veiled in saffron and purple. She blinks back tears.

"Dani, do you want a wedding? Because we could--"

"No, Dan'yel. All I want is you."

He takes her in his arms and holds her against his chest. She can feel his heart beat.

They'll survive here.

But this is not home.

It never was.

#

A few hours later, Jack comes to drive them out to the house. Special Documents is working on updating their document packages, bringing them back into the world, but until then, they can't (legally) drive. She, Dr. Lam has already told her, can't drive at all until the baby comes. Not that she could fit behind a steering wheel, in any case.

An airman brings boxes, helping them pack the suitable contents of their quarters to take with them. Everything but the actual uniforms, and that turns out to be quite a lot. Their clothes from Edora. The things salvaged from storage. Odds and ends of anonymous military issue, which are certainly better than going naked.

#

It takes Daniel and Jack both to get her into the truck's cab -- the boxes go into the truckbed -- and the seatbelt simply won't fit around her.

It's summer here. The air smells strange.

Jack drives like a little old lady all the way to the house.

#

The house looks faintly ragged and forlorn; unloved, unoccupied. The landscaping has all been changed. Several of the bushes she remembers have been torn out. Jack pulls into the driveway. Getting out of the truck's easier than getting in. Daniel simply lifts her out.

"Been working out a little there, eh, Danny Boy?" Jack says.

"Sowing, reaping, shooting, that sort of thing," Daniel says.

"Shooting?" Jack asks, raising his eyebrows.

"Longbow."

They'd traded for it. She could make a good quarterstaff, and she could even make and fletch arrows, but making a longbow was a skill beyond her means. Daniel had become a very good shot. An arrow would penetrate a _Goa'uld_ force shield. It was slow enough. And it would kill.

Some _Goa'uld_ \-- a very few -- had escaped being drawn into the huge battle between the _Goa'uld_ and the Replicators, and -- better yet, at least from _their_ point of view -- had avoided being annihilated by Apophis and Ba'al in the years leading up to it. The _Goa'uld_ might be without Jaffa now, but they hadn't lost their vast caches of technology and their taste for conquest.

She and Daniel had killed one or two.

Jack goes ahead to open the door.

"You're okay with this?" Daniel asks her.

"It's just a house."

He doesn't believe her, but is kind enough to let her get away with the lie.

Once she had meant to come here -- a different here, but she can't help thinking of it as the same house -- as a bride. Now she's coming here to live as the wife of a different man. And it's not that she loves someone else. It's that she loves someone _also._

The world can be awfully odd.

It's easier to be Daniel, in her imagination. If Sha're were somehow discovered alive tomorrow, if she came back to her husband by some impossible miracle, Daniel would simply have both of them. Sha're would be First Wife, which would only be fair, and that would hurt a little, but fair's fair, even if Sha're is her younger sister and ought, by rights, to be Second Wife.

There's polyandry on Abydos, but it's so rare as to be nearly legendary.

She refuses to finish that thought.

Daniel helps her up the steps. The house is baking hot. The curtains are drawn, cutting off the view from the deck, and all of the mementos and much of the furniture's gone. It looks as if someone has died here.

The house she knew is gone. Even its shadow is gone. All the memories she built upon this alien earth are gone, swept away. There's nothing left.

Tears well up in her eyes.

"Sorry about that," Jack says, coming out of the kitchen. "Storm last week must have tripped the circuit breaker. Power's back on now, but you won't have ice for a couple of hours. Not much in the fridge anyway. Beer, maybe." He goes to open the door to the deck.

She wonders if he'd sell. She wonders if they could possibly afford to buy.

Madness? Necrophilia? It's got three bedrooms -- though the other two are tiny -- and another half bath, so Baby Jack's needs would be covered. Two car garage. Close to the SGC -- if they stay here…

Oh, god, what is she thinking? She's losing her mind, is all.

"Dani, are you okay?" Daniel whispers urgently. Tears she can't stop spill down her cheeks.

"She's pregnant," Jack says, matter-of-factly, coming back. "Come out on the deck for a few minutes. It'll be cooler." He puts a hand in the middle of her back and propels her out to the deck, not allowing her to argue. It _is_ cooler there. There's a breeze.

The grill, the table, and the bench are gone. Everything looks strange, as if she's tumbled into yet another half-familiar universe. She holds onto the rail with one hand to steady herself, wiping at her eyes, but the tears won't stop. From the corner of her eye, she can see Jack and Daniel at the other end of the deck, and realizes that Jack's keeping Daniel from …hovering.

It occurs to her, with a stunning sense of revelation, that Jack has been through this before. 'This' meaning dealing with pregnant women. With Sara.

She has no idea how to cope with knowing that. It feels horribly, unwantedly intimate. She knew it, of course. Knew about Charlie. He'd told her on Abydos. But realizing it -- here -- is another matter.

She turns away. Goes back into the house.

#

"You two ever talk about him?" O'Neill asks Daniel. "Jack?"

The other one.

Daniel laughs, just a little bitterly. "We talk about Sha're," he offers.

"You know she…" He isn't quite sure what he's going to say. But he _does_ know if Daniel follows Dani into the house right now she's probably going to hit him. Nobody wants that.

"Loves me? Doesn't love you? Will always love him? Hates him just a little for sending her back here? Sure, Jack. Just because we don't talk about it doesn't mean I don't know."

Daniel follows his wife into the house. _Well, that went well,_ O'Neill thinks.

They came back. It was the best thing for them -- and the SGC really needs both of them, right about now. But Daniel's always been a little skittish -- and a lot touchy, especially when he's just been dragged back to Earth.

And O'Neill doesn't think Dani actually wanted to come back at all.

#

Daniel finds her in the master bathroom, splashing water on her face. He opens the door to the deck, starting a breeze. It's hot in here. But at least there's furniture. He glances at the bed. Goes into the bathroom.

"Are we staying?" he asks, standing in the doorway.

She straightens, leaning on the sink. He can see her face reflected in the mirror. It's flushed. Damp tendrils of loose hair cling to her cheeks and her neck.

"Of course we're staying," she says steadily. She pulls a towel from the rack -- the house is an odd combination of emptied-out and ready-for-occupancy -- and scrubs at her face. "I'm just glad there's _some_ furniture." There's a sudden violent rumble, as the a/c finally re-sets and kicks in. Cold air begins to blow through the room. "So if you guys would go get the boxes out of the truck, I can start unpacking."

"You're not going to do the unpacking."

"Unpacking doesn't do itself."

"Dani--"

"I am pregnant, not crippled. And _you_ are going to the store."

"I am?" This is interesting news.

She smiles at him, turning around. Comes as close to him as she can, which means sort of a sideways snuggle these days. When he puts an arm around her, he can feel the baby -- their daughter, he's sure -- move beneath her skin.

"Do _you_ want to eat whatever's in that refrigerator? I don't. And close the doors before you go. As I recall, they stick."

#

She sits on the couch, a glass of water in her hand, listening to the truck pull out of the driveway. The boxes are stacked in the living room. Not so many of them to make a life out of. God knows what Jack and Daniel between them will come back with. She just hopes some of it's edible.

Alone now, she takes inventory of the house.

The dining room furniture -- breakfront and all -- is gone. The dinette in the kitchen is still there, though. She opens the refrigerator. Two cases of beer and nothing else. The inside of the refrigerator's still warm. The beer's probably skunked.

Coffee. A coffeemaker. Mugs. An assortment of mismatched silverware. One or two plates and bowls. A frying pan. The things she remembers from The Other Side are gone. The washer and dryer are still there, back in the mud room.

Well, it's been three years. Jack must have moved most of his stuff to Washington by now. And why not? It's his.

In the living room, the television, stereo, chair and hassock, and one of the floor lamps is gone. But the couch is still there, and so are both end tables and the coffee table. There really seems to be no rhyme nor reason to what was taken and what was left.

All the personal mementoes are gone, of course.

The bedroom has been left essentially untouched. Most of the furniture's there. The closet and all the drawers are empty, except for a couple of coats and a pair of snow boots at the back of the closet. There's still a robe hanging on the back of the bathroom door. Dark blue. From the SGC. Stolen, of course. She sighs heavily.

The half-bath in the hall is aseptic, obviously completely unused.

The larger of the other bedrooms -- it used to be a combination of office and junk room -- is completely empty. She looks around, assessing its possibilities as a nursery. They'll have to buy baby furniture. A cradle. Clothes.

She wants a rocking chair.

The smaller bedroom -- it's at the back, and was always dark -- is half-filled with sealed storage cartons, neatly labeled.

The linen closet's still full of linens. Sheets and towels and blankets. One less thing to worry about. Daniel will have to change the sheets on the bed, as she isn't going to wrestle with it.

She goes back to the living room and begins unpacking boxes. Sha're's picture goes in the bedroom. She makes several trips, going back and forth, not carrying very much each time. The things that need to be hung up she lays out on the bed; stretching to do that would be too much strain at the moment.

She empties the boxes. Most of their contents go in the bedroom. Daniel's new laptop and the alabaster casket from her office go on the coffee table. She sets her purse beside it and goes into the kitchen for another glass of water.

She glances at her wrist, wondering how long Jack and Daniel have been gone. Old habits come back quickly. No watch there. No clock here, that she's seen. She wonders if there's a watch in her purse. Although the battery will probably be dead by now. But she still looks.

She and Daniel have always been packrats, and her purse reflects it. In addition to her wallet -- on the top, as she had to show ID each morning when she checked into The Mountain -- there is…

A set of keys for a home that no longer exists.

Her passport.

Hairbrush, lipstick -- she'd tried to keep wearing it, even at her worst -- loose change, a half-empty bottle of those horrible poison pills. She must have needed to renew them that day.

Kleenex, pens, a notepad. A bound journal. Cellphone, battery dead. Beeper. Also dead. A pair of earrings in a plastic envelope.

She snorts in disbelief. Her birthday earrings from Sam, still safe and sound. Daniel tucked them into her purse for safekeeping after she left them on the _Daedalus_ when she went home and she'd never taken them out. She takes them out now, and puts the tiny golden triangles into her ears.

A handful of hard candy, wrapped in cellophane. A couple of now-ancient chocolate bars.

There's a watch. Her gold dress watch. Stopped, of course. She adds it to the pile.

The purse is empty now, but she sweeps her hand around the bottom just to make sure.

No.

Not empty.

There's something else.

She recognizes it the moment her fingers touch it.

Her engagement ring from The Other Side. She slides it onto her ring finger, but it sticks even before it reaches the bottom knuckle. Her hands are swollen with pregnancy and summer. And the truck's pulling into the driveway.

For one wild panicked moment her only thought is to hide the ring. Instead, she takes a deep breath and pulls it off her finger. She drops it back into her purse and begins calmly piling the other contents back in on top of it. Hiding it.

From whom?

#

They've bought more than groceries. Jack comes in carrying a television set. She regards him, baffled.

"Wedding present," he explains. "You guys should catch up on current events." He sets it down in the corner, notes the empty boxes. "Been busy."

She shrugs. "Not that much to unpack."

"There are a few things in storage from your house."

Well, that's interesting news. After all this time? She wonders what survived. Who chose. How long they were going to save them.

The fish are undoubtedly gone.

#

The kitchen fills with grocery bags. She wonders where the money for all this came from. They had labor equity built up on Edora -- they were going to winter with Laira, and get a house put up for them after spring planting, if all went well -- but labor equity wouldn't transfer. They'd left their packs, their spare clothes, and all of their trade goods behind on Edora as well. Not that any of that would have been of any use here. Except as a curiosity. They have cash in their wallets, of course, but less than three hundred dollars between them. It won't go far.

She wonders what happened to their bank accounts.

She pokes through the bags. Daniel's apparently ridden herd on Jack. Most of it's fresh: fruits and vegetables, fish, chicken. Bread that looks more like what she's become used to. Flour, butter, sugar, oatmeal. Baking powder and yeast. Dried fruit. Cider.

Peanut butter. She opens the jar and scoops out a fingerful while nobody's in the kitchen to see. Puts it in her mouth and winces at the taste. Too sweet, too greasy. Did she actually used to like this? She sets the jar aside. It's odd seeing every season crammed together at once: spring greens and summer fruits and harvest grains; the agricultural bounty of a highly-developed technological society that can force Nature to do its bidding, or nearly.

She puts things away until Daniel notices what she's doing and stops her. She'd really like to argue, but she won't in front of Jack. Why does coming back to Earth suddenly mean she can't do any of the things she was doing a week ago? Last week she was watching children, feeding chickens, working at the loom, even churning butter. Suddenly she's made of glass.

They'll have this out when they're alone.

#

Daniel invites Jack to stay for dinner. He'll do the cooking of course; she can babysit a meal, and even cook a little, but he's still by far the better cook. Jack declines, to Dani's faint surprise. There's some Washington business he has to deal with long-distance, he says, so he needs to get back to The Mountain. Their documents should be ready tomorrow, and he can bring them by, or Carter can. Run Daniel out to the storage facility so they can pick up the rest of their things.

They see him to the door, then Daniel goes back into the kitchen. She follows. She's taken inventory of what they have to cook with already -- not so much -- and watches while he does the same. The two of them. Alone. In Jack's house.

"Should have taken a look before I went shopping," he mutters, pulling out the frying pan.

Meanwhile, she frames arguments. _'Don't cosset me?'_ But she's pregnant -- more so by the day -- and it's foolish to pretend, so far along, she doesn't need special help. Or want it. Just not so much so suddenly that she doesn't think she needs. Doesn't need. Really.

 _'Don't order me around?'_ He's gotten awfully bossy since they came back. As if he's going to make the plans and she's going to follow them. Okay, she decided they'd stay here. But he decided they'd even come and live in this house. Or try to.

"Look, what's wrong with you?" they say, at almost the same moment. It should be funny, but she isn't in any mood to be amused, and from his expression, neither is he.

"You're treating me like a…" she isn't quite sure what. "I'm not that fragile," she finishes quietly.

"I thought I could do this, but I can't. I don't know how Jack ever did it."

She keeps her face very still. There's only one construction she can put on his words. He doesn't want her. He can't imagine anyone -- _Jack_ \-- wanting her.

"All right, Daniel," she says calmly. "You don't have to do this." She turns around and walks out of the kitchen. Today the mere absence of floor lamps has made her cry, but she doesn't cry now. She just feels scoured.

"Dani! Wait! What did you…? We can't just send her back."

His words don't make any sense.

"We won't bother you. I can take care of us. You don't have to…" Well, 'worry' isn't going to be the word, is it? And he can't feel either guilty or responsible, since he's dumping her. She can't imagine what went so wrong so fast. He wanted her this morning. Or at least pretended he did. So they could get through the debriefing?

She turns and looks at him. He looks scared. Of her? _For_ her?

"What did you think I said?" he repeats, finishing the sentence this time.

It occurs to her that she might have, must have, could have misunderstood him. That he meant something else. And she doesn't like thinking that, because deciphering the unspoken words, the words that people aren't saying, has always been one of her special skills, and suddenly she can't hear Daniel's.

"That you don't want…" _Me._ "…us."

He shakes his head decisively. "No. That's not true. It's… when we started out to have a baby, I didn't realize… Dani, I worry _all the time_. Even when we were on Edora -- if something had gone wrong, you could have been dead before I could have gotten through to the SGC for help."

They hadn't known there was a pardon then. He would have turned himself in to save her life.

"Women have babies all the time, Daniel. You've delivered babies. They've been fine."

"I know. But this is _you_. And all I can think of is what can go wrong. Even now that we're here. And once she's born--"

She doesn't correct him.

"--what do either of us know about raising a child? How do we keep her safe? What do we teach her? What if something _happens_?" The desperation in his voice stops her thinking about herself. She walks back and takes his hand. His fingers are cold, and there's no answering pressure.

"We don't know much about raising a baby. We can learn. Keep her safe? We'll have the whole SGC to help, so I guess that settles whether we go back. We can teach her languages, just for a start. And she's a boy." He doesn't smile at the old familiar teasing. "Nothing's going to go wrong. Dr. Lam says I'm fine. She'll take care of me. I like her."

He isn't convinced.

Right now, of course, in some ways the baby isn't a baby. For her, she knows -- with the insight of being the one who actually has the living timebomb in her belly; he's right about the danger, though she'll never admit it to him -- the baby's half a way of resurrecting a dead man and half a way of absolving herself of the guilt of wanting to. And of course, the baby's also a way to keep Daniel alive, should the most terrible thing she can imagine happen, because she's always been just as afraid of losing him as he is of losing her right now.

"I don't want you to die, either," she says, hanging her head. "I guess we're in the wrong business."

"I guess we are," he says, after a long pause. "So… dinner?"

The problem isn't solved. It never will be solved as long as they're willing to risk their lives for other people, for a cause, for an ideal, for a dream. But they've managed to set it aside again.

For now.

#

"It's my considered recommendation, General, that you don't send either of those kids into harm's way for at least a year." The words are formal -- well, fairly formal. The venue is not. They're drinking Scotch in General Hunnicutt's on-Base quarters.

She raises her eyebrows. "Think they're going to bolt again, Jack?"

He sips his Scotch. "No. Dani won't leave Daniel or the baby." He just hopes nothing goes wrong when it's time for the kid to be born. He doesn't think she'd be anyone he recognized afterward, if something happened. Or maybe someone he recognizes all too well. "And Daniel won't leave them. Daniel wants to stay on Earth -- at least as a home base. But they need … time."

He's not sure what would happen if there was …trouble. Call it a hunch, though he's not clear on the details of how it would play out. He knows they didn't stay _out_ of trouble while they were on the run, though Daniel hasn't given him much to go on. He's said they killed at least two _Goa'uld_ , though, something the SGC might be able to confirm, if they can get more details out of them. Carter says Dani's told her they 'played Zorro.'

Zorro had a secret identity to hide behind. And a place to come home to.

They've been in the field _way_ too long. Daniel conceals it better than Dani does, but there's something just a bit … feral … about them now. They need time to forget that. Or to bury it deep.

"I'll try to learn from Hank Landry's mistakes," Erin Hunnicutt says dryly. "They haven't really agreed to stay, you know."

"They will." O'Neill's certain of it. He saw that old look in Daniel's eyes when he told him about the Ba'al situation. He knows Daniel will have told Dani. They're probably both kicking the Jaffa problem around right now.

"Once they agree, you might want to have Daniel go talk to the Jaffa Parliament. Always better when you can argue with them in their own language, and he's got history there. And Dani actually _likes_ the _Tok'ra_."

"I can run my own command, Jack."

"I'm just sayin'."

"Good suggestions, though. Dakara's about the safest offworld place there is, next to the Alpha Site."

They won't want to be cooped up on Earth either, of course. It's going to be a problem. Not his, thank God.

#

The temperature has dropped with evening. They open the doors and windows, turn off the a/c and turn on the fan, and cook fish. Everything here's either too hot or too cold, but with the house open, it's better.

Fish, bread, fruit, cider. A normal meal. They don't turn on the lights. The summer twilight is long, and Earth and Edora's Stargate's are fairly closely synchronized, but on Edora the day pretty much ends with the light, especially in summer. She'll need to reset her internal clock again, get used to turning the night into day.

Afterward she cleans up -- he lets her do that, it's just loading the dishwasher -- while he finishes putting away things in the bedroom. When he comes back from that, he unpacks the television set.

She regards him in pained disbelief.

"Well, he's right. We really should find out what's going on."

She gestures at the computer. It's got a wireless Internet connection.

"That, too," he says.

#

Dani has a nightmare that night. One of the bad ones. He has to wake her, and barely escapes getting hit.

"Hathor wants the baby," she gasps, before she really knows what she's saying.

He turns on the bedside light, lifts her into his arms. The t-shirt she wore to bed is soaked with sweat. Her skin is clammy and wet.

She finally told him what happened between her and Hathor, back when they were talking about trying to get pregnant instead of trying to avoid it. He'd always known that -- before Coyote -- she was sterile but hadn't known why. Mirror universes are bizarre things. Why should Hathor have been drawn to his female counterpart at all? Hathor'd had pretty much no use for women.

Of course, he would have been just as glad if Hathor had ignored him too.

"Hathor's dead. All the System Lords are dead. It was a dream."

"A dream." She sighs, then groans. "Woke the baby."

He puts his hand over her belly. Feels the prodding against his hand. The baby is indeed active. He checks his watch. Almost four. The sun will be up soon.

"Want a cup of tea?"

She nods. "I'm going to shower."

#

The bathtub has grab-rails on the walls; Jack came injured from missions often enough to want them. They make it easier for her to maneuver in the shower. She stands under the warm water, rinsing the last of the dream away. She can't really remember it, only that it was …bad.

Then the cramp comes, nearly driving her to her knees. She feels as if somebody's just hit her across the base of the spine with an iron bar.

No. The baby can't come now.

But there are none of the other signs of labor, all of which she knows. She's still carrying high. The amniotic sac hasn't burst. No blood, either, which is good.

False labor. Indigestion.

Still, it hurts. And it will drive Daniel right over the edge, because by the time a car can get from the SGC to here and drive them back to the infirmary, it will be at least an hour and a half. But she will not start managing Daniel with lies and misdirection now. It's unworthy of both of them. She climbs out of the shower and pulls Jack's robe off the back of the door. Wraps it around herself and goes to tell Daniel to call The Mountain.

Help comes faster than she thought. The SGC simply sends an ambulance to bring her to a local hospital. She's there in less than forty minutes. Someone from the Air Force meets her there, tells her Daniel's on the way. Nobody asks her any questions she can't answer.

The doctor agrees she isn't going into labor, but administers a mild, harmless, and completely safe -- he assures her -- muscle relaxant anyway. They move her upstairs, to a private room, for a few hours' observation. She wonders who said what to whom for her to get this kind of treatment. Everything moves very fast, as if she were the President, or a visiting king. The only reason she's put up with any of it is for Daniel's sake. He comes in as soon as the nurses leave, as if he's had to sneak past them, and for all she knows, he has.

"You okay?" she asks.

"The, uh, Air Force drove me here. Took care of everything. Insurance, and, um, where I -- we -- work, and, um…"

She yawns; the muscle-relaxant has made her sleepy. "We still working for Deep Space Telemetry?"

"Cryptographic analysis of deep-space radio signals."

It's always been their cover story. Something a linguist could plausibly be doing, among all those soldiers and astrophysicists.

"I told you it was nothing."

"You did."

"And I'm fine."

"You are."

"So why don't you go home and get a few hours sleep, then come back here and bust me out?"

He doesn't leave. And she doesn't get to go home. Dr. Lam arrives at the hospital an hour later. She wants to run all the tests she ran less than two days ago all over again. Dani takes a second ambulance ride, this time back to The Mountain.

It's comforting, really.

Dr. Lam reminds her of Janet.

Just a little.

#

At least the SGC Infirmary's familiar territory. Once she's settled into a bed, she convinces Daniel to go and get breakfast, if not to rest. "And I suppose…" she says.

"We should tell General Hunnicutt we're back?" he says. Not quite a question.

She nods.

"I'll be back soon," he promises.

"Don't hurry. I'll be right here."

And perfectly safe.

#

Dr. Lam takes blood, tells her there's a battery of tests scheduled. An OB/GYN specialist is flying in: they managed to get security clearances for one. A nurse brings her a breakfast tray. Chamomile tea. Orange juice, eggs, toast, applesauce. She picks at it. The bread has no flavor, and the applesauce is too sweet. She really needs to get used to the local food.

Sam comes in. "Couldn't stay away, eh?"

Dani smiles. "It wasn't anything. But, you know…"

"Probably better to be careful. Carolyn says you and the baby are perfectly healthy, but with all that Gate-travel you were doing while you were pregnant…"

"Sam, Jack was practically conceived going through a Gate. I'm sure he's fine."

Sam raises her eyebrows. "'Jack?'"

"We're naming him Jack," Dani says, a little defiantly.

"I thought you didn't want Carolyn to tell you the sex."

" _I'm_ sure."

Sam smiles. "Daniel's sure it's a girl."

Dani shrugs. "He's been wrong before."

Sam shakes her head. "Well, you'll know soon enough."

"Not soon enough for me," Dani says feelingly.

"They say the last few weeks are the hardest."

"At the moment, I just can't…" Figure out how she got into this situation? Figure out _why_ she got into this situation? How she's going to get out of it?

Actually, she knows the answers to all three of those questions. In great detail.

"I love him, Sam," she explains. It seems to cover everything.

Sam grins at her. "When did you figure that out?"

Dani's answering smile fades. "A few months after I got back to The Other Side."

Sam's looking at her with sympathy now. Almost …pity. "You really didn't know?"

#

It's odd, Sam thinks. She knew, practically from the moment she set eyes on Daniel's _doppelganger_ , that Danielle Jackson was in love with the Colonel Jack O'Neill she'd left behind. It took her a while to figure out Dani didn't quite realize it. Watched her figure it out, and the knowledge almost tear her apart. Because the man Dani was in love with, was -- as far as they knew -- dead.

Was, in fact, at the time, dead.

And at the same time, Dani had been falling in love with Daniel.

Daniel had been the one who worked hardest to help her fit in to her new world. Had done the most to reach out to her, but Daniel was like that, always picking up emotional strays. Dani had seemed so self-contained, so fiercely determined to have nothing to do with any of them. Not really like Daniel, in that respect.

Sam supposes she'd just stopped thinking of her as a version of Daniel once they'd got Daniel back, and never stopped to really think about how an Alternate Daniel would feel, trapped in an Alternate Universe knowing all his friends were dead. Dani had done her best, Sam realizes now, to make her forget.

Daniel had never stopped thinking about it.

She remembers SG-1's rescue mission to P9X-430. General O'Neill -- Colonel then -- could have flayed Dani alive for going off the book the way she had, ignoring mission protocol to look for her missing teammates. But Daniel would have done the same thing.

If she'd had any notion of what she was going to find in Dani's office the day they'd got back, she'd never have gone in. She'd just never expected…

Obviously, they thought of each other -- even then -- as distinctly Other.

Obviously.

But Dani had looked so _guilty_ … As if she'd known what she was doing was wrong.

It was, in her mind, but kissing her mirror twin wasn't the wrong thing. It had taken Sam years -- literally -- to figure that out. Being happy had been the wrong thing.

And when she fell in love again, she still didn't recognize it for what it was. She was simply convinced it was a universal truth that anyone and everyone would want Daniel Jackson, and anyone who said they didn't, was lying. Or -- if she were feeling charitable that day -- mistaken.

 _If I'd ever really understood that, would I have made the damned time machine work?_ Sam wonders. Was it _really_ necessary for Dani to go home and watch her universe die, to give up Daniel, to lose her Jack O'Neill yet again? She could have stayed here, skipped that whole time loop. She and Daniel would probably be in Pegasus right now, reading Ancient.

Happy.

Oblivious.

If Dani hadn't learned what the Furlings wanted to know, maybe they just wouldn't have come back. That would have been a solution, too.

A little too late now to think of that.

And Dani hadn't known, when she'd gone, it would all be for nothing. She'd gone to protect her universe from the Furling gifts. She wouldn't have stayed here for love, any more than she'd gone back just for love. Love's important, God knows, but it's not the only thing in life. Honor, duty, loyalty, family. Service. Ideals. The words sound old-fashioned, even to Sam, but they're what she lives by.

And certainly Daniel -- and by extension, Dani -- have always had enough ideals for any two people. Daniel, Sam knows, has always been sure people will choose to do the right thing if given a free choice. Dani, she suspects, feels people ought to do that, probably won't, but keeps hoping to be proven wrong.

She so rarely has been.

"I really didn't know," Dani says. She sounds amused and despairing all at once. "I loved him, of course. I knew _that_. But that's not the same as being _in love_. But… I still had to go."

Sam looks at her uncertainly.

"What I learned there was needed here. So I had to go back and learn it."

"But you couldn't have known that when you went," Sam says, baffled. It sounds like fairy tale logic to her. Something with knightly quests and lost princesses.

"I didn't know it," Dani says patiently. "I had to go find out. I was chasing the Furlings. For -- oh, years and years and years I'd been chasing them. And then I caught them and made them go away." There's satisfaction in her voice.

"And now that you've done that? Now what?"

"What we _were_ doing. A family. A life. It will just be here now, instead of out there." She looks at Sam, and when she speaks again, her voice is hesitant. "I know you don't think Daniel and I should…"

"Dani, I've never seen Daniel this happy in his life," Sam says quickly, side-stepping the implied question.

She knew Sha're -- alive and as Sha're -- for less than an hour. All the time Sam has known Daniel, he's been living with that loss. Attempting to repair it; change it; undo it … or simply to endure it. And so what she says is true. He is happy with Dana -- Dani -- in a way she thought he reserved for the contemplation of ancient texts and alien artifacts.

Not living things.

She's never seen two people so much in love. Daniel left the SGC for Dani. Left Earth. But they have the same parents, the same past -- why don't they think of each other as brother and sister?

"Sam, he's a _nervous wreck._ "

"Well, he's about to become a father." In a form of incest -- at least biologically -- so pure it might as well involve cloning. "Mark was just the same way."

Dani shakes her head in amazement. "And Angie had _two_ kids. And they're still married."

"Yep," Sam says. "They say the second one's easier."

" _Second_ one?" Dani says, sounding horrified.

"Second what?" Daniel asks. "Hi, Sam."

#

He leans over and kisses her. It still seems very odd to be kissed inside the SGC. In front of Sam.

 _" <Sam says if I have a second child you will be much calmer,>"_ Dani tells him in Abydan. It is their private language. They are its last speakers.

"I think we should have the first one first," Daniel replies in English. He regards Sam innocently.

"So, Daniel," she says, equally blandly. "How are you settling in?"

"Oh, pretty well. Jack says we've got some stuff in storage. I kind of wonder what's there."

"Pictures, mostly. Some of your artifacts and art objects. A few books and papers. One or two small pieces of furniture. It was a little awkward. You weren't dead -- this time -- but we weren't sure…"

If she'd ever see him again. That seems clear to Dani. Sometimes Daniel and Sam seem like brother and sister to her in the way they behave together.

"So it was you?" Daniel asks.

"Yeah. Pretty much. Look, General Hunnicutt thought the two of you might like some help getting everything organized. Picking up a few things."

"Help meaning you?" Daniel guesses.

"Does that mean I get to get out of here?" Dani asks.

"Probably not," Daniel tells her. "Don't you have a doctor to see?"

"I don't have any shoes," she points out sulkily. She doesn't; only three pairs of boots, one Edoran. But after last night, she isn't going to push him again soon. His fear frightened her.

"We should be able to find you a few basic pieces," Sam says. "Something that isn't either olive drab or black, anyway."

"Sam," Dani says, suddenly remembering something. "I'm going to need baby furniture. I don't know how to buy that."

Sam looks blank. "I have no idea."

Daniel shrugs. "Maybe the Internet? It's not like we can ask the Research Department to check into it."

It's a tempting thought, but no.

#

Daniel goes off with Sam, promising to come back for her in a few hours, after she's seen the specialist. He'll lease a car for them -- their updated documents have come through -- and she can probably go back to the house tonight. At least she can get out of the infirmary.

She sees the specialist. More poking, more prodding.

Amniocentesis. It's wildly painful, but both doctors promise her it will do no harm to the baby, only allow them to do detailed genetic testing. Because the baby's parents are so closely related, is the unspoken subtext.

Will Baby Jack have their allergies? Their need for glasses? Their talent for languages? Genes shuffle in every generation. They both resemble their mother; he could take after their father. Or Nicholas. Or someone further up their unknown family tree.

In a month -- or two -- they'll know.

Lunch.

Dr. Lam wants her to eat more. She doesn't want to explain all the food tastes awful.

#

"Dani, I'd like to talk to you about your delivery options."

She's told Dr. Lam to call her Dani. After three years, she doesn't answer to 'Dr. Ballard' any more, and she isn't sure yet whether she's 'Dr. Jackson.' Or going to be. It might be too confusing, with both her and Daniel working here.

But it's her _name._

Never mind that right now.

'Delivery options.'

"For when the baby's born."

"Yes. Considering everything -- including that you're a little old to be having a first baby -- I think a Caesarian section might be your safest alternative. You're really pretty narrow, and the baby's big. That way we could schedule the delivery, make sure nothing went wrong. It wouldn't interfere if you decided to have more children, so you don't have to worry about that."

Cutting her open.

Reaching into her.

Taking her baby.

"No," Dani says flatly.

Dr. Lam looks a little startled. "I really think you should consider it. Maybe discuss it with your husband?"

" _No._ I mean, I'm sure Daniel will support my decision, Doctor."

"Well, why don't you think about it for a while?"

Dr. Lam leaves.

She can think about it until Hell freezes over, and she won't change her mind. However, there are other things she can think about right now, and she does.

#

"I'm sorry to bother you, General Hunnicutt, but I've been speaking to Dr. Jackson -- Dani -- about her medical condition."

"She's pregnant, Doctor. She doesn't have the plague. What did our specialist say?"

Dr. Lam sits down. "All things considered, she's surprisingly healthy, and so is the baby. There are no gross abnormalities or fetal malformations. We did an amniocentesis today, which should let us read the fine print, but despite the, well, close relationship of the parents in a genetic sense, they seem to have produced a fine healthy baby."

"Which doesn't explain why you're here in my office, Doctor."

"Actually, General, it does. It's a fine, healthy, _large_ baby, and so naturally I recommended a C-section as the safest and most practical means of delivery. She absolutely refused to consider it, or to discuss it with her ... husband. It's not only her physical health I'm worried about, but her emotional health as well. She seemed to be… extremely upset by the entire idea."

General Hunnicutt snorts. "Obviously you haven't read her _entire_ file, Carolyn. The _Goa'uld_ Hathor did a field hysterectomy on her. She might be a little touchy on the subject of further …meddling."

Dr. Lam sighs. "I'm sorry, General. She said advanced aliens had replaced her reproductive organs, but I'd just assumed she'd lost her original set due to injury."

"You might call it that," the General says. She takes a deep breath, staring at a place beyond Dr. Lam's left shoulder. "The more I deal with the people who've dealt with the _Goa'uld_ , the more I feel we really need to deal with the _Goa'uld_ once and for all." She straightens her shoulders, refocuses her attention on the doctor once more. "Be that as it may. When the time comes, I expect you to do what's right and proper, in your best medical judgment, for the health of both mother and child. Meanwhile, do what you can to convince Dr. Jackson you don't intend to pull rank on her, or she may just try to have the baby at home. And that might not work out."

"Yes, General."

#

She's thinking about how to get back through the Gate. It will be difficult, but not impossible. They've broken out of fortresses before.

She'll need to steal a passcard that will get her down to Level 28. She can do that if she can incapacitate enough people. She doesn't want to kill anyone. They're still her friends and colleagues.

There are aerosol sleeper agents stored in the Armory. She should be able to get there. They trust her. She'll put on a mask, release a couple canisters of it into the halls. That should buy her the time to release it into the vents. Each level's self-contained, true, but she can go level by level. Maybe put it in the elevator. It won't take out everyone, but enough that she should be able to get to the Gateroom. With a zat, she can take out anyone who's still awake. They won't shoot her. She's sure of that.

She'll go to Kheb. Daniel will know to look for her there. They left a cache of supplies at the temple -- a small one -- and there's shelter. She knows she can walk that far.

She hates the thought of running without him, but they aren't leaving her any choice. All this poking. All this prodding. Lam talking about cutting her open.

Maybe she can wait until Daniel gets back. She can talk him into it, she thinks. They'll just stay away until the baby's born, come back then. It will be safer.

Jack comes into the infirmary. He's in dress uniform, carrying a flight bag.

"Came to say goodbye. Got an early flight back to Washington. Guess I missed Daniel."

"He's out shopping with Sam."

"We'll catch up. So… how'd you like the old place?"

"Needs some work. The roses are gone."

"Yeah, well, tried renting it out a couple of times. Never worked out." He's looking down at her, eyebrows raised, as if waiting for an answer from her, but she's not sure what the question is.

"I might put some back in," she says, thinking about it. Red ones, she thinks. Sha're would have liked them.

He grins at her. "You do that. And take care of Daniel."

"Come back and see us."

"I will. Take care of yourself, too."

"Promise."

When he leaves, she finds she's no longer thinking about running.

#

She's starting to wonder if Daniel and Sam are coming back at all -- it's after six -- when they arrive. Dr. Lam has already said she can go home, but she does need someone -- like her husband -- to drive her there.

Daniel's in new clothes. Civilian clothes.

He's wearing a polo shirt and slacks. Loafers.

He looks like he belongs here.

Sam's carrying a large shopping bag with geese on the side.

"This is for you," she says. "The rest's at the house."

She takes the bag, heads off behind the screen in the corner to dress.

"You missed Jack," she says. "He's gone back to Washington."

"Actually, he called Sam's cell," Daniel says. "Said something about you digging up his yard?"

"Sort of."

#

Sam has guessed her sizes pretty accurately. She has sneakers. Maternity jeans. A voluminous pink top. She looks like somebody's suburban wife.

When she comes out, Daniel takes her hand. He's wearing a ring. It wasn't there when he came in. She's sure of it.

Third finger, left hand.

She glances up at Sam. Sam's smiling, looking a little damp around the eyes.

"I got one for you, too," he says. _Of course_. "But I'm pretty sure you won't be able to wear it yet. So I got a chain." He reaches into his pocket, holds out his hand. Plain gold circlet. Heap of chain.

She tries on the ring. It doesn't fit. But it will. He takes it, threads it on the chain, clasps the chain around her neck. The gold warms against her skin.

Now they're ready to leave.

#

Daniel's leased… a minivan. One of those enormously suburban things designed to be filled with kids and dogs. The idea being, of course, that the cargo-space -- the passenger seats all fold down flat -- can be used to convey all the cargo they've yet to acquire. It has four wheel drive, too. Winter's coming.

The baby will be here long before.

He drives her home, cautiously. There's a seat-belt-extender, so the seat-belt fits.

Sam rides in the back. Her car's parked at the house. They ask her to stay to dinner and she accepts. They have dishes now, apparently. And cookware.

They arrive, park. Go inside.

#

It's a different house.

Their pictures clutter the mantle, adorn the walls. Yesterday's boxes are gone, as well as any storage boxes from today. The African masks from Daniel's bedroom are hung on the living-room walls. There's an Egyptian tea-table in the corner, polished brightly.

A media cabinet for the television. A clock over the fireplace. Throw pillows on the couch. An afghan she recognizes as belonging to Sam.

A rocking chair.

"No wonder you two were gone so long," she says, marveling.

"Yeah, well, this place needed a lot of work," he says. "Still does. I bought dining room furniture, too, but it won't be delivered for a few days."

"We should plant roses," Dani says.

Daniel smiles.

#

They do plant roses. Or, rather, Sam and Daniel plant roses while she watches, two weeks later. Daniel's already been to Dakara once, with SG-1. He went briefly, just to meet the new Jaffa leaders. Dani stayed on-Base, waiting for him to come back.

He came back. It was fine.

She's Dr. Dana Ballard-Jackson now. All her ID says so.

General Hunnicutt accepted them back with grace. They aren't, Dani discovers, entirely penniless: their accounts have been held in escrow; Daniel's house has been sold, but that money has also been held in account. With interest, it's a surprising amount. She wonders, again, if Jack will sell.

She hasn't discussed the matter with Daniel yet.

However, Daniel and Jack talk frequently. She assumes this, on the basis of information Daniel conveys to her that can only be the product of such talks, like the fact Jack's willing to rent them the house indefinitely. That's good, as it's filling up with things she can't even begin to think about moving. It's getting to the point where they may need that third bedroom soon.

Sam saved their journals, the ones that were at the house. The ones that were at the SGC, like Daniel's books, and hers, made their way into the keeping of others. Daniel's been working on getting them back.

They share an office now. An enormous space at the end of the corridor on 18. She suspects it was storage until they were assigned to it. Certainly she doesn't remember it being anyone's office, here or in The Other Reality. It's now a double workspace for them. She thinks the combined square footage may actually be larger than the sum of their old offices. What it is, most of all, at the moment, is barren. But it's filling up.

They're members of the SGC again, and there's work to do, though by Carolyn's orders she spends half the day resting in A3 quarters. She doesn't mind. She can work as well lying on her back as at her desk, and it's more comfortable. She sleeps, too, when she's tired. The baby's just as important -- even more so -- than the project she's working on at the moment anyway. At least in her mind.

Ba'al's on Earth. The Jaffa are hunting him here, in violation of their treaty. Dakara needs to be industrialized. The _Tok'ra_ need to be persuaded to give up the method of manufacturing _tretonin_ so the Jaffa can become truly independent.

Start anywhere.

Daniel goes back and forth between Earth and Dakara once or twice a week, staying only a few hours each time, building relationships with the Jaffa he doesn't already know. Soon he'll need to go there to begin work in earnest, just as she'll need to go to talk to the _Tok'ra_. Meanwhile, the SGC must work more closely with the NID than ever before.

There's so much to do.

But she sleeps serenely through every warning klaxon. Almost -- once, memorably -- through the warning for the autodestruct.

#

The sound awakens her from a deep sleep. The lights in her quarters are flashing red. Autodestruct. General Hunnicutt is blowing up the Base.

She grabs her glasses, sits up, slides her feet into her shoes -- her uniform is a series of compromises these days -- either she's going to have the baby any minute, or some time in the next few weeks -- pulls herself to her feet. General Hunnicutt's calling for an emergency evacuation.

Something has gone very wrong.

It's sixteen stories to the surface up narrow evacuation ladders from where she is now. If the elevators aren't working, and she doubts they are. Not if the self-destruct's running. She gets to the door just as Daniel opens it. Two SFs are with him.

"Come on," he says.

"What's going on?"

He shakes his head. He doesn't know.

The halls are filled with people bugging out. It stirs memories she thought were safely exorcized. She pushes them aside. She'll never make it to the surface. She's not completely sure she can even fit into the shaft, and she knows she can't make the climb.

She has to try. Gate Teams don't give up.

In her heart, she will always be SG-1.

"Elevators out?" she asks.

"We're in full lock-down."

She holds his hand, waiting for their turn to evacuate. They're just about to enter the shaft when the lights overhead stop flashing red.

"This is General Hunnicutt. We have an All Clear. Repeat: All Clear. You may stand down. Repeat: Stand Down."

The siren stills. The lights return to normal. She sighs with relief. Daniel puts his arms around her.

He's trembling.

A few minutes later the elevators are unlocked. They go back to their office.

"You could have been killed," he tells her, as if speaking slowly will make his words more apprehensible.

 _He_ could have been killed. They could _all_ have been killed. "It's never gone off yet," she says reasonably.

Not here.

"I'll find out what happened, later," he says. "Sam will know."

If he were still on SG-1, he'd know now. Does he want another Gate Team assignment? She knows he can get one. Easily. He can almost certainly get SG-1 back, if he wants it.

But the near-miss reminds them both of something they already knew: just being at The Mountain, in the SGC, is dangerous. That night, when they're at home, he tells her he doesn't want her coming in to work any more. Wants her to stay at the house until the baby's born.

She thinks about it. But then? What then? Will she leave Baby Jack to be raised by strangers, or will she keep him with her? And if he's with her, where will _she_ be?

She refuses.

The fight that follows is long, ugly, and quiet.

Ugly, because they stick to the truth.

Ugly, because they know too much truth about each other.

He's afraid for her safety. Afraid for their baby's safety. She will not give up freedom -- her work -- for safety.

Not even for her child's safety.

He calls her selfish.

She tells him that at least, if things go the way he obviously expects, their child will be dead and not trapped in a foster home, considering that his mother made the same choice she's about to.

 _Their_ mother, he points out. And she hardly made the choice to take her baby to work on top of a nuclear warhead.

"But she's still dead," Dani counters. "Both our parents are dead. We watched them die. There are no safe places."

"And to prove that," Daniel answers, his voice very cold, "you want to take our baby to one of the _least_ safe places on Earth."

"That's where I'm needed. I'm not leaving him behind to be raised by strangers while I do my work somewhere else."

"The SGC's no place for a baby. Born or unborn."

"The SGC's the front lines. It's no place for anybody. But somebody has to do it. Catherine picked us. We're good at what we do."

"You're confusing 'good' with 'vital.' And don't you think it's time you came out of mourning? You don't mean Catherine. You mean Jack."

"'Yes, Simon,' 'No, Simon,' 'How very smart you are, Simon,' 'What a brilliant discovery, Simon,' 'Can I bring you another cup of _tea_ , Simon'"

"Stop it."

"Oh, Daniel, I'm just getting started. You're going back to Dakara in a couple of months to stay for a while. That's still on. I was supposed to go talk to the _Tok'ra_ about the same time. Where was the baby going to be?"

He shakes his head, angry and confused.

"Born by then. I'll still be breast-feeding. We pre-briefed on the mission ten days ago. You were okay with it then. Where was the baby going to be?"

"I hadn't thought it through. Now I have, and I'm just not going to--"

"Oh yes you are, Danny Boy."

The rhythm and the inflection, if not the pitch, are purely Jack's. It's enough to startle Daniel. It makes her smile. Not a pretty smile. She can bring Jack to bed with them any time she likes. He lives beneath her skin. Always.

They're on the edge, now, of inflicting mortal wounds. They can see it in each other's eyes. It's long past midnight. They've been arguing, with steady persistence and increasing venom, for hours.

_Declare victory and get out, Indy._

The voice inside startles her as well. There's no arguing with it; not that tone. There never was.

 _Yes, Jack._ She takes a deep breath. Stills her anger. Makes her voice as gentle as she can.

"Daniel, this is our life, nuclear warheads and all. We work for the SGC. I'll never join another Gate Team, but you might. I'll be afraid for you, but going and doing what we do is part of the job. We've done a lot of good out there. Whether you're proud of it or not, it's necessary." He raises a hand, but she doesn't stop. "We've all been lucky over the years. I guess I just hope our luck will hold, and the SGC won't blow up while I'm there. But for the rest… I'll be going offworld to talk to the _Tok'ra_. I have to. If I don't, the whole Alliance falls apart and we'll have the _Goa'uld_ back again. I'll be taking the baby with me. And when we're not offworld with the _Tok'ra_ , the baby's going to be in our office at the SGC. General Hunnicutt's already agreed."

He shakes his head, but he doesn't interrupt her. "I've thought about this a lot in the last month. I think it would be worse to hand him -- or her -- over to strangers to raise than to take a few risks. Most of the time the SGC is safe. I helped destroy Apophis' spacefleet. I can protect one baby. I can't … abandon … the baby." Cannot give her child up to strangers, to be raised by strangers, to live, in any version, the same life she -- they -- have led. The unmentionable gulf from eight to sixteen.

Daniel paces back and forth, working through it, not so much angry anymore as bruised. He's as tired of fighting as she is, but they can't resolve the central problem, only learn to live with it.

_I can't keep you safe._

The words belong to both of them.

And now there will be a baby they can't keep safe either, because she won't give up the SGC. What she can do there makes too much difference in too many lives.

She leans her head back against the couch and closes her eyes.

"Dani?"

She opens her eyes.

"I don't like it," he says simply. Quietly.

"I don't like the fact that someday you're going to go off and maybe get yourself killed for somebody who doesn't deserve it, but I'll kiss you goodbye when you go."

He stares at the floor. She can almost feel him trying not to smile. "I'll hold you to that." There's a pause. "What about you?"

They're negotiating now. At last. Tears of exhaustion and relief prickle at the corners of her eyes.

"Daniel, until the baby goes off to college the most dangerous place I intend to go is my office. Offworld, yes, but there are plenty of perfectly safe planets. The _Tok'ra_ aren't exactly thrill-seekers, and with the _Goa'uld_ fleets gone, they're pretty safe. After the _Tok'ra_ , I don't know where General Hunnicutt's going to want to send me, but she knows I'll be taking the baby. So I think the only places I'll be going are places like Edora. For a long time."

She senses him trying it on, seeing how it fits.

"I thought you might want to…"

Still be out in the field? Still be doing what they'd been doing when they were on their own? Yes, a little.

More than a little.

"Over and done," she says, letting it go. Her past, the self she was, all Jack trained her to be. Daniel doesn't know all she gives up in that moment. The final relinquishment of what she was with Jack. The final acceptance of what she is now. But perhaps he senses it. The last of the anger drains from his face. From his body. "Maybe when he's older, though, he'd like to come along and help."

"'She,'" Daniel says. He sits down beside her now -- first time this evening; he's spent most of it pacing up and down. "And yeah, I can see Hunnicutt's face now when I suggest an under-twelve SG Team to her."

She leans her head against his shoulder. He puts an arm around her. "You're staying home tomorrow," he says. "Just tomorrow."

"It's already tomorrow," she says, "and yes." _Mission accomplished, Jack._

_Good job, Indy._

#

They've been back seven weeks. Carolyn says the baby's ready to be born, but hasn't said anything further about a Caesarian. Dani's read a great deal about pregnancy, filling in the gaps in her knowledge. The house -- their house, as she thinks of it now -- is filled with furniture. Books. Flowers. Gifts from friends.

They've painted the nursery the color of sand.

There's a cradle, a gift from Laira. Some other pieces. A chest for baby clothes. She found a place to shop on-line.

She's had a nagging backache for two days that just won't leave. The baby has dropped. It's the first sign. The birth will be very soon.

She's discussed what Carolyn wants to do about the birth with Daniel. She tries to be reasonable about it with him. It's possible, after all, that Coyote meant a baby to kill her. He knew, after all, they'd run. That she would eventually get pregnant. That she would almost surely have the baby on some world like Edora. Or a place even more primitive.

In the end, they can't be sure what will happen.

#

She's in the kitchen, making coffee -- Daniel's coffee, not hers -- when suddenly her thin cotton nightgown's soaked to the knees. Water runs down her legs, pools on the floor.

She drops paper towels on the puddle. Pulls up the wet fabric. Sniffs. Salt. Brack.

It's time.

Goes to get Daniel out of the shower.

#

They've won a compromise with Carolyn. She can cut if she has to, to save Dani's life, and that of the baby, but not otherwise. They'll hope he won't have to.

For most of the day Dani paces the infirmary, shaved and prepped. The contractions are infrequent at first, but painful when they come. The baby's in no hurry to make his appearance. He definitely takes after his father in that respect.

When he finally makes up his mind, though, he's quick.

It hurts, but she's felt much worse. Not -- quite -- like this. This pain is more reasonable, somehow. Almost healthy, instead of a symptom of disaster, or someone's anger. And Daniel is there, telling her to breathe, to push.

She hears no voice but his.

No drugs. No cutting. She's grimly determined to play out Coyote's last gift as he gave it, and in the end, she's able to.

There's a gasp. A cry. It sounds like a cat.

"A girl," Daniel says, sounding shaken and triumphant.

Girl?

He hands the baby to the nurse and puts both hands on her slackened belly, pressing gently. She gasps and twists. One last contraction. The afterbirth. A rush of fluid.

"Everything's fine," she hears Carolyn say. "You have a lovely daughter. A great big girl. Eight pounds, fourteen ounces."

Daniel wipes her face one last time, settles her glasses on her nose.

Carolyn's holding the baby, wrapped in a warming blanket. Only a tiny red face -- very squished -- is showing.

She holds out her arms. _Hers._

The baby's so tiny.

 _" <A boy next time, Dana're,>"_ Daniel promises.

#

She's never considered girl's names. When she wakes up later -- clean and clothed and tucked into a corner of the infirmary with the baby in a cot beside her -- she and Daniel discuss it, and settle on Joanna Claire. She can't really see naming her Jacqueline. It's too feminine, and Dani still dislikes feminine names. Joan is the feminine of John. It's close enough.

But she's called the baby Jack all through her pregnancy, and doesn't stop now. She may be Joanna on her birth certificate, but to Dani, she's Jackie.

They take a month off to settle in to being parents.

They need it.

Babies, apparently, don't sleep.

At first they move the cradle into the bedroom, which helps, then just take the baby into the bed, which helps more. She can do everything but change her without getting up. Or really waking up.

Jackie's a good baby, from everything Dani knows and has read about babies. She doesn't fuss. Dani carries her around the house slung in the shawl she brought back from Edora. She can see already she'll need to get a couple more. Possibly in olive drab and Air Force Blue.

"You're going to have to set her down sometime," Daniel says.

"When she learns to walk," Dani tells him.

When they go back to the SGC, they take the cradle.

A week later, they both go offworld.

#

A few years later there's another child, a boy this time, just as Daniel promised. The second pregnancy's easier, even with an active three-year-old underfoot. Dani's been through all this before, and this time they're not on the run.

Just as well. Daniel's away, offplanet, for a number of missions during her pregnancy. It's the usual mix of easy, normal but hard, and unmitigated disaster. He's there for the birth, but barely.

As she promised him before Jackie was born, she never asks him not to go. This is their life, their purpose. If it's important enough for her to be here at the SGC -- pregnant, and with Jackie -- it's important enough for him to go through the Gate.

She tells Jackie bedtime stories that all end well.

Naming the boy is harder, as neither of them wants to saddle a child with 'Melburne', nor will she name two children Joan and John. Daniel refuses to name the boy after himself. She likes Nicholas, but he doesn't.

They compromise on Samuel Charles.

#

COLORADO SPRINGS, 2017:

Jack retired this year at sixty-five, and finally went off permanently to that Minnesota cabin he's always sworn was Paradise on Earth.

They've visited there, with the children.

She's done harder things.

This is the year the Stargate becomes public knowledge. Of course the rumors have been flying since about 2012, as every government on Earth was finally fully briefed, but now the official announcement has finally been made. Alien device. Star travel. Space fleet.

The documentary shot at the SGC almost a quarter of a century ago is finally aired. She hadn't known it showed Janet's death -- hers didn't -- and Daniel's forgotten to tell her. It's a nasty shock.

Jack, Daniel, and Sam all look so _young._

Jackie's eight. Her brother Charlie is five. They don't let them watch it. They understand where Mommy and Daddy work -- both of them have been offworld since before they could walk -- and not to talk about it, but knowing, and seeing scary things, are entirely different matters.

Thank god both kids are in private, and very exclusive schools.

They're all celebrities after the Stargate Program goes public -- everyone from the SGC, and especially the Gate Teams is, really -- and everybody wants to talk to them, have them write a book, go on lecture tours. Jack refuses to have anything to do with all the fuss. There isn't even a phone at his cabin.

Sam's the one who catches the hot potato -- she took over from Erin at the SGC a year or so ago -- and is stuck with dealing with a lot of the media. It's a feeding frenzy. The press homes in on Daniel, too, and on her.

Daniel refuses to talk to any reporters, of course. He's always hated them. He has a bit more reason than she does, come to that. He becomes a nine-days' wonder -- there's no help for that. They take the kids and hide out in Cheyenne Mountain even though Sam tells them it will just make things worse.

Daniel doesn't care. He just wants to get away from the reporters, keep them from bothering his family. He's gotten more stubborn with age, Dani thinks.

The revelation of the Stargate changes the world, but like most sweeping changes, it isn't going to happen all at once. The immediate result is a wave of incredulity and late-night talk show jokes, followed by a number of inaccurate quickie TV specials, followed -- eventually, but not too soon for them -- by general public boredom with the subject.

There's talk of moving the Gate to Washington, putting it under the aegis of an international oversight committee. Well, the international committee was inevitable. She has mixed feelings about leaving Colorado Springs, though. She's spent so much of her life here -- they eventually did buy the house. But she hates the winters.

Washington, at least, will be warmer.

#

GEORGETOWN, 2022:

They're living in Washington, now -- Georgetown, to be precise -- working for the International Stargate Commission. The Stargate's in a building downtown. They call it a high-security building. Laughable, compared to where it used to be.

Jackie's thirteen this year. Charlie's ten.

Daniel isn't in the field any more, at least not -- except by the accidents that still, inevitably, happen in a galaxy full of unknowns -- under fire and in dangerous situations. She breathes a private -- very private -- prayer of relief for that. He may live to see his children grow up.

Five years after the Great Revelation the fuss has died down a bit, oiled by the beads and trinkets of alien technology coming into worldwide currency. Since the US Government, through the Stargate Program, _owns_ all this stuff, it's apparently a very good thing for the sitting President to be able to dole out the patent rights, and it fuels the kind of boom economy not seen for almost a century. She doesn't pay a lot of attention.

There's a new wing of the National Air and Space Museum dedicated to the old SGC, too, with a mockup of the Gateroom and a museum of offworld artifacts. It seems faintly familiar, somehow, but she can't say just why.

They went for the dedication ceremony -- sort of had to, as Daniel was making the dedication speech. Black tie. Reporters. Stupid questions. People asking Daniel what it was like serving with Jack O'Neill. People asking her what it was like being married to Daniel. Those were the ones who didn't quite know who she was. The ones who did -- who knew she was Dr. Dana Ballard-Jackson, SGC, former member of a Gate Team, asked even stupider ones.

She's going grey. Daniel's hairline is receding, just as Cassandra said it would. It makes him look rather distinguished, she thinks.

Bifocals, too, unfortunately. For both of them. There are a number of new medical advances available, based on things brought back through the Gate, but after having been mauled and meddled with so many times in their careers by alien technologies, they'd both really rather … not.

She and Daniel are world-famous authorities now. Heroes. Famous. Notorious. It depends on who you ask. Fortunately, a lot of the SGC records are still classified, and will be until the end of time. Fame embarrasses both of them. But they're able to do the one thing she wants most with it, and redeem Nicholas Ballard's academic reputation. Even if he isn't 'her' Nicholas Ballard, it still matters to her.

Every year -- it will probably go on forever -- people keep badgering them both to write a book about their lives and experiences on the Gate Teams, but they always refuse. It's nice to be able to finally publish academically, though.

Everybody wants to second-guess the SGC about the way they handled the whole _Goa'uld_ thing, but it's a dead issue. There are no _Goa'uld_ left.

#

"How's Uncle Jack?" Charlie asks. "Is he coming for Christmas?"

It's December. She's getting out the ornaments.

Like just about every other family in America with children, no matter their religious persuasion, they celebrate Christmas. Tree, presents, archaic dinner. The whole thing. Some of the ornaments are a little odd, though.

Cassandra comes, of course. She works at the ISC now. Sam, when she can. Other friends, extended family.

Jack's come for Christmas almost every year since Jackie was born. He missed last Christmas, though he sent presents for the kids. Daniel's seen him since and so has Sam. They say he's fine.

Jack O'Neill is not really a topic of discussion in the Jackson household.

"He's good. I'll ask him. Maybe."

Jack never calls or writes -- she writes to him, about the kids, mostly, or Daniel, but hasn't heard back from him in over a year. He doesn't have the Internet, of course, but she has a system for keeping track of him, involving weekly calls to the owner of the bait and grocery store where he shops, who's willing to tell her if he's seen Jack lately. A more than seven day absence, unexplained, will be grounds for a quick flight to Minnesota. She's warned Jack of this, by letter.

It occurs to her occasionally that Jack may have bribed the man to lie to her, but there's nothing she can do about that. At least her letters to the cabin aren't being returned by the Post Office.

If any man has earned the right to spend the rest of his life on his own terms, it's Jack O'Neill.

#

GEORGETOWN, 2040:

Jackie writes -- to Daniel, mostly -- but her letters are infrequent. Jackie's in Space Command -- _that_ came as a bit of a shock. God knows where she writes from.

Charlie spends a lot of time with the _Tok'ra_. He's followed in the family footsteps: Anthropology and Linguistics. No surprises there.

One day he comes home.

They meet him at the Stargate. It's just bizarre for it to be in a groundlevel building that, well, almost anybody could get into. You don't even need to be a member of the ISC to get access. Charlie isn't. He's a university professor at Harvard. A civilian.

Charlie steps through right on schedule.

Oddly, he towers over Daniel. He looks much more like his grandfather Melburne than he looks like either of them; black curly hair, but Daniel's -- and hers, of course -- blue eyes. They get those from both their parents.

That's a good thing, the difference. Jackie looks enough like them both to be their clone. Inside, though, she's all Jack, while Charlie, no matter what he looks like, is exactly like Daniel. Whoever said genetics is an exact science didn't know what they were talking about.

They hug. He looks fit and pale. An interesting combination that comes from spending all his time in the _Tok'ra_ tunnels. The _Goa'uld_ may be defeated and gone, but the _Tok'ra_ aren't going to give up their traditional way of life any time soon.

They head home. Washington traffic's eternally hideous, even with the ring transporters taking up so much of the slack. Daniel starts dinner while she settles Charlie's things in the guest room. It _is_ a guest room, now. Both their children are grown and flown.

"How's Jackie?"

"Out there somewhere. She might be home for Christmas."

Doubtful, though. She sends cards and presents, but in the last ten years she's managed to miss four Christmasses. Probably just as well, as all they seem to do is fight about ISC policy and the bad choices the old SGC made.

Charlie makes a derisive noise. He and his sister don't entirely get along. She startled Daniel -- who thinks she's wasting her intellect -- and hurt Charlie with her decision to go into the Air Force. Dani -- who had expected it on some level -- just told her to aim high -- it's the Air Force motto, after all. But despite the fact that Dani was the only one who supported Jackie's choice, she actually gets along with Jackie even worse than either Daniel or Charlie does, and has for years. Her life with Jackie during Jackie's childhood was a love affair. Perfect. Then suddenly one day everything changed, and Dani's been the enemy ever since. For more than half of Jackie's life by now.

Jackie's thirty-one this year. She's a Captain in Space Command. Sometimes Dani thinks she chose that service because it was the farthest away from her parents she could get.

She has no idea what went wrong between her and her daughter.

"How's your work coming?" she asks.

"Okay. I've met someone."

He says it so casually that at first she doesn't react. Then she understands. Met someone. As in _the_ someone.

"Well, when do we get to meet her?"

He grins. It's Daniel's smile. "Soon. But I want to tell you all the details first."

#

"No!"

Daniel's yelling.

Daniel. Yelling.

"I've made up my mind!"

The two men in her life -- Charlie and Daniel -- are standing in the middle of her living room, bellowing at each other at the top of their lungs.

Charlie has decided to join with a _Tok'ra_ named Ashmel. Blend. Permanently.

Become a _host_.

"You are not putting a snake in your head!"

Is that really Daniel? Honestly, it sounds just like Jack.

"She's not a snake! She's a person! And I love her and want to spend the rest of my life with her!"

"You are too young to make that decision!"

"I'm older than you were when you went through the Stargate the first time!"

He's right. Charlie's 28. Old enough to make up his own mind about things.

Thank god Jackie isn't home. They'd have a real fight on their hands, then. But Jackie's probably at the other end of the galaxy. And she never thought she'd be grateful for that.

She and Daniel have been married 34 years now. Back on Earth for thirty-one of them.

"That has _nothing_ to do with--"

"Charlie." She walks between them, making Charlie step back. Both of them -- thank god -- shut up for a moment. "I need some things from the store. Go and get them for me. _Now_."

Ah, she can still muster up the O'Neill Voice when she has to.

"I just want to--"

"The store."

"But you didn't hear--"

The whole damned neighborhood probably heard.

"The store."

"Dani, we aren't--"

"Daniel, you can finish when he gets back." She looks at her son again. "Now."

He stops glaring at Daniel -- her first victory -- and stomps over to the door. Opens the closet for his coat. "What do you need?" he asks, sounding sulky.

"Use your initiative. But buy a lot of it," she tells him.

He almost rebels then, but Charlie, thank god, has always had a strong sense of the ridiculous. He grins at her and walks out.

"No," Daniel says, as soon as the door closes.

"All right," she says, putting her arms around him.

"You're trying to get around me," he says. "I'm not letting you do it. I'm not letting _him_ do it."

"Yeah," she says. "He's in love with a snake. He's going to have about three centuries of pain-free immortality and vast wisdom. We, on the other hand, won't have grandkids. If you say he can't do it, he'll still do it, and then _both_ of our kids won't be talking to us. Oh, and you want to explain to Sam when she phones later how you kicked your kid out because he became a _Tok'ra_? Her _dad_ was a _Tok'ra_."

"That was different," Daniel says sullenly. "He was dying."

And Ashmel's current host is undoubtedly dying. _Tok'ra_ switch hosts for no other reason. Without a new host, Ashmel will die. Of course, these days there's no shortage of hosts.

"Charlie wants to do this. He knows his own mind. At his age, you'd already bought your first wife for a candy bar on a planet several dozen light years from Earth."

And lost her to Amonet. But the memory of Sha're still makes him smile. She'll never own the place in his heart that Sha're holds, and that's all right.

"And? Do we talk about your second wife now? Because people who marry their cross-dimensional doubles don't really get to complain about other people's choice of partners, do they?"

Daniel isn't going to be diverted.

"He isn't going to have a life. He's going to have whatever Ashmel chooses to let him have. What if--" He stops.

It's not, she realizes, actually about Charlie getting a snake in his head -- although after Sha're and Amonet, Sarah Gardner and Osiris, it isn't an easy subject for him. It's about Charlie disappearing entirely. Everything Charlie could be. Everything Charlie could do. She leans her head against his chest, rubs his back. Feels the boniness of age. They've both lived to grow old. Long odds against that. They've beaten them.

"Daniel, you know the _Tok'ra_ and their partners in a Blending don't sleep. Charlie and Ashmel will have twenty-four hours a day to work. Charlie's primary field of research is the history of the _Goa'uld_ and the _Tok'ra_. Where better to learn about it than from a _Tok'ra_? I'm sure that's why Ashmel's interested in him, too. He's not just another pretty body, you know."

"You think Ashmel's an anthropologist?" Daniel asks cautiously, after a long pause.

"I think the _Tok'ra_ have gone into something besides sabotaging _Goa'uld_ spaceships by now," she answers. "They were always scientists. Ask him."

_Use… little words._

#

GEORGETOWN, 2045:

It's Christmas again.

Jackie's come home for Christmas. The first time in five years. She's been busy, she says. But it's classified.

She's been home for a couple of other visits in that time -- just overnight, when she had a stopover in Washington. Not long enough for things to get awkward.

She came home for Jack's funeral, of course.

Now they're both dead, there and here. Jack-here is buried in Arlington. They all pulled every string they could to keep the funeral quiet. That didn't keep the media from running 'Death of an American Hero' stories for most of the week. Somehow their television got broken in the process. They've never replaced it.

Since the funeral, Dani's never been back to the grave. She's seen too many graves, too many funerals.

But now her wayward daughter's coming home. Jackie has a week's leave, and is supposed to be spending it here. Dani wonders how long they'll all actually manage to be civil to each other. She knows why Jackie's making the effort. The attraction is Charlie/Ashmel. She wants to meet the newest member of the family, and he wants to meet her.

Asked, specifically, if she'd come.

#

Dinner goes off passably. Sam rings in from the West Coast; she's retired now, and lives near Mark and his family. Cassie's here, too, happy to see Sam again. Sam and Daniel's lives have been intertwined with hers from the time she was very small, and will -- by the alchemy of time-travel -- be intertwined with Cassandra's until she's old; she has an appointment to keep with SG-1 at Cheyenne Mountain, in the fullness of age. Fortunately there's a second Stargate stored there now, in the old SGC, in case of emergency, so it will be there, about twenty years from now, when Daniel and Sam and Jack and Teal'c come tumbling through.

Dani understands they've very nearly mastered the theory behind using the Gate itself for time travel, since they have the Ancient timeship to work backward from. She's sure they'll master it in time, since after all, Cassie uses the technology to send her -- Daniel -- back to their own time. It's confusing seeing it from the other end. Or nearly so. She knows she won't live to see the Daniel of the past keep that appointment with his future. Neither of them will.

Jackie unbends enough to tell General Carter far more of what she's been up to lately than she's ever shared with her parents. It's fascinating to listen to; the ISC and Space Command are different worlds these days, and share as little information as they can get away with.

They open presents. Dani's bought presents for both Charlie and Ashmel, though figuring out what to buy a _Tok'ra_ requires ingenuity.

But then it's time for Sam to leave. Charlie drives her back to the ring depot. Cassie leaves too; it's just the family, then, and the silence that descends is anything but companionable. Jackie goes over and stares down into the fire, as though trying to read her fortune there. Dani takes one couch, Daniel takes the other.

She likes to be able to watch his face -- she always has, and always will, love the sight of him: the stunning beauty of his youth has become a beauty of an entirely different yet still compelling kind with age -- and has learned, over the years, that the young dislike the sight of the old touching one another, as if the gift of physical comfort is a privilege withdrawn by the advance of years. The young, as always, want the world to exist in their image.

When Charlie returns, Ashmel wants to talk.

"I have long been curious about the customs of human holiday celebrations," he says. "Charlie offered me the opportunity to experience this one. I am wondering if it is typical."

"I suppose so," Daniel answers. "There are a number of variations. This is one."

Jackie has her back to them all, staring down into the burning logs. She snorts faintly, derisively.

"An occasion upon which family members gather together to reaffirm the bonds of love and biological kinship?" Ashmel asks. The _Tok'ra_ looks at Jackie.

"Yes, that's one way of looking at it," Daniel says cautiously.

"Yet you do not do so," Ashmel says.

"Okay," Daniel says decisively. "I want to talk to Charlie."

But Ashmel doesn't give up dominance. "Charlie wishes to know why his mother and sister always fight," Ashmel says. "He hopes for a reconciliation."

"And you sent a _Tok'ra_ to ask me?" Jackie demands, turning around, sounding angry and incredulous.

" _Charlie_ ," Daniel says firmly.

"Well, I _do_ , Dad," Charlie says.

"Coward," Jackie says.

"Don't talk to your brother that way," Dani says automatically.

"I'm leaving," Jackie says, stepping away from the fireplace. "Thanks for dinner, Dad. Nice presents."

"Oh, come on, Joanie. You haven't even had your big fight with Mom yet," Charlie says coaxingly. For him, that's a pretty nasty crack.

Jackie just glares at him. "We do not fight," she says through gritted teeth.

"No," Charlie says. "It's just everything Mom does is wrong. Has been ever since I was a kid. Why?"

Jackie's furious. Dani can see that. And she hasn't even had to say a word. "I suppose you feel you have a right to know," Jackie says to Charlie.

"I'd _like_ to know."

" _You_ feel you have a right to know," she says to Dani. It isn't a question.

"I think I'm entitled to know what I did wrong, yes," Dani answers evenly. Might as well get the fight started.

Jackie smiles tightly. It's a lot like Jack. But then, she was around Jack a lot when she was little. Or maybe it's an Air Force thing. "The truth, then. A present. Because it's Christmas. And I hope Ashmel enjoys it. You see, a long time ago, I wondered who my _real_ father was. It was stupid," Jackie smiles apologetically at Daniel, a real smile this time. "I was just a kid. I'd overheard Mom and Aunt Sam talking one night, and… it turns out I'd got the wrong idea."

Dani glances across the room at Daniel. She has no idea what conversation -- over twenty years in the past it must be -- Jackie might be referring to.

"Well," Jackie says blandly, "since Mom and Aunt Sam were sort of comparing notes, I kind of figured--"

"Joanna," Daniel says, in the voice that means she'd better not take that sentence any further.

Jackie doesn't shrug guiltily. Air Force officers don't shrug guiltily. "Anyway, I asked Uncle Jack. And he told me where Mom was really from, and that in her universe she'd been going to marry him until she came here and married you instead."

Jackie's still talking to Daniel, not to her. This history of her life, reduced to the simplistic language suitable for -- what would Jackie have been? Perhaps twelve? -- is too etiolated even to hurt. She wonders what a young almost-teenager made of it.

"So Uncle Jack wasn't my father. Well, I hadn't really thought so. I don't look anything like him. But you know, there's one thing I have wondered all these years, ever since I found out. How could you do it?" Jackie's voice is tight with accusation, her eyes on Dani's face now. Dani thinks she knows what's coming next. If Jack told Jackie the truth, she'll bring up the matter of her marrying Daniel now. She only wonders why it's taken her so long.

She doesn't. "How could you just leave him there to die?"

Dani feels as if she's just been punched in the stomach. Apparently Jack told her daughter a little more than she thought. How can Jackie ask her that? Jackie's in the Air Force, an officer.

It occurs to her, distantly, that Jackie's is a peacetime military. The _Goa'uld_ were wiped out, once and for all, about the time she entered High School. The Wraith have never managed to leave Pegasus, and their numbers are fewer ever year. Jackie's is a _Star Trek_ space navy. She's never had to make the decisions Dani has, Daniel has.

Jack…

"Dying was his job," she answers evenly. "Surviving was mine."

Jackie regards her with contempt. "I suppose you couldn't wait to get back here to your one true love."

It's a subject she and Daniel have always walked wide of, to the point where they simply never mention Jack-there at all. To find the unspeakable inverted and thrown into her face this way is a stunning pain.

"Joanna, that's enough," Daniel says sharply.

"Oh, I'm used to it by now," Jackie says caustically. "Being on the outside. Being left out. The two of you have always been all you ever needed. What place was there for me -- or Charlie?"

"Hey, leave us -- me -- out of this," Charlie says. Dani can hear the hint of Ashmel in his voice now, even though it's Charlie who's speaking. "I was fine."

"No surprise you went with a _Tok'ra_ ," Jackie snaps. "You'll never be alone."

Daniel takes off his glasses and polishes them on the tail of his shirt. "Okay. I guess we all should've had this talk a long time ago. And I guess it's really our fault for not sitting down with you and explaining to you exactly where your mother's from, and how she got here. But while you were little, the Program was still a secret, and even afterward, a lot of it was still classified, so we had to be careful about how much to tell you. And then, the stuff about the alternate universe, well, it just seemed best for everyone if we left that buried. But all that isn't really the point right now. Joanna, do you really think your mother and I neglected you all your life because we were, ah, too caught up in each other?"

Her perfect child. Her promise child. The product of Coyote's gift and final trick. She remembers traveling all over the Galaxy with Jackie slung on her back. As a baby, Jackie slept first in a cradle, then in a crib, in her office at the SGC. When she'd been school-age, they'd had many careful talks about what Jackie could and couldn't tell her schoolmates about what she saw and did. She'd never made a single mistake, and Dani had been so proud of her. Not love her? As well not love Daniel.

As well not love Jack.

This ought to be _her_ fight with her daughter -- the latest of many, and all ending fruitlessly -- but she finds she doesn't have the heart for another one. After all these years, she thinks she finally understands the roots of the grudge Jackie has carried with her for so long; that Dani loves her mirror-double so much there's no room for anything else in the world. It would be funny, if it weren't so unbearably sad. She might as well let her daughter rip her heart out one more time and let the rest go.

"Well, weren't you?"

"I, ah, asked you first," Daniel replies.

Jackie folds her arms and ducks her chin -- the gesture is Daniel's, exactly, with nothing of Jack -- and doesn't answer.

"I love Dani. And I love Charlie. And I love you. We're a family. Parents love their children. We lost our parents at an early age. We wanted our children to have the life growing up we didn't. It's the same thing any parent wants for his children."

"Oh, for God's sake, Dad, don't manage me like I'm the Jaffa Parliament!" Jackie snaps. "I'm not twelve any more!"

"Sure acting like it," Charlie says. He cocks his head, as if listening, and Dani knows he is. "And Dad asked you a question. Do you think he and Mom neglected you because they were in love with each other?"

"That's none of your business!" Jackie says. "In fact, I'm finished with this conversation."

"Be finished with it then." It's Ashmel speaking now. "And since you have no interest in being a part of this family, go and never come back."

"What?" Dani and Jackie speak in chorus.

"No," Dani says firmly. "I know you mean well, Ashmel, but I really don't care whether she wants to be a member of the family or not. Nobody is ordering my daughter out of my house. Now or ever."

She looks at Jackie. "I'm sorry I wasn't the mother you deserved. I thought I'd be better at it. Or that it would be easier. I love you, but I know that doesn't make much difference really. So--" she shrugs. "We cut our losses."

"And do what?" Jackie has always asked the question after the last one it would be a good idea to ask.

Dani sighs. "You will always be welcome here. But you might prefer to leave it at cards at Christmas, I suppose. You have a wonderful career, a great apartment off Nellis AFB -- so I hear -- and I'm sure you'll make General someday if you want to. Or quit the Air Force. if that's what you want."

"Don't you _care?_ " Jackie asks. She sounds a little lost.

"I care that you're happy. I care about that a lot. But I can't tell you what's going to make you happy. How can I? You're the only one who can do that. Once you do, I'll try to help you get it. That's as far as I go."

"Because I'm your daughter," Jackie says, as if trying out a new theory.

"That's right."

"Well… what if you think I'm wrong about something?" She sounds thirteen instead of thirty-five.

"I'll tell you what I think -- if you want to hear it -- and you can make up your own mind."

Jackie looks toward Daniel. Appeal toward a higher authority? God knows why, almost everything's going her way tonight. And she's old enough to stand on her own two feet: at 35, Dani had been going through the Stargate for almost a decade. She'd blown up Apophis' fleet. She'd been to the past, the future, and walked on hundreds of worlds. Visited other dimensions.

Watched her own world die.

Jackie, of course, has done few of the same things, though Dani assumes -- without certain knowledge -- she's been to other planets. Jackie has heard about what her father has done -- and she knows, if she knows the doppelganger story, her mother's done just the same things. But she doesn't know these tales from her parents, because they don't talk about these things.

"You've felt left out," Daniel says, half questioning.

Jackie looks back and forth between them. Dani sees Jackie make up her mind to go all the way with this. In that moment, hurting as she is, she's proud of her daughter's courage.

"Who wouldn't, Dad? It wasn't so bad when I was a little kid -- and the Program being a secret helped -- but when I got older there was a lot of stuff I couldn't help finding out. You were the _famous_ Dr. Jackson, Dad. The guy who made the Stargate work. You'd been on SG-1 with General O'Neill and General Carter and First Minister Teal'c. You'd saved Earth about a million times. Mom, well, Mom wasn't so bad. She'd just been on a Gate Team, like a bunch of other guys."

She turns. Now she isn't talking to Daniel anymore, but to Dani.

"Then I had that little talk with Uncle Jack, and found out in the universe next door, you'd done everything that Dad had, _plus_ crossed dimensions just so you could be with him, and hadn't bothered to tell me. How was I supposed to live up to that? How could I ever do half the things either of you had done, even if I lived to be a hundred? And don't forget the greatest love story of two worlds! A little bizarre, maybe, but there hasn't been a day I've seen you together you don't spend half of it falling into each other's eyes. No one else really exists for the two of you, do they?"

Daniel has a terrible temper. Well, she does too. But where in their genes does this over-the-top instinct for drama come from? She glances across the room at Daniel, framing the question with a tilt of her head, and sees the answering flash of amused bemusement in his eyes.

"Oh, there you go again!"

Love and war are very similar. Jackie's confusing the two. Dani used to look into Sammy's eyes just the same way, with the same unspoken communication. They're talking. That's all. "That isn't true, Jackie," she says.

"My name is Joanna," her daughter says with icy dignity. "You can't even remember my name."

"That's it," Daniel says with a sigh. It takes a lot to shift his temper, but if you do, what's done is done. He gets up from the other couch and comes and sits down next to Dani, putting an arm around her shoulders. "She remembers your name perfectly well. She chose it. She calls you Jackie because she thought you were going to be a boy, and if you were, we were going to name you for Jack. Joanna, as you know, is one of the feminine variants of John, for which the nickname is Jack."

"Which Jack?" Joanna says, thinking she's being clever.

"Hers," Daniel says, without missing a beat.

Jackie's startled. Apparently she had not expected so much truth. People always underestimate Daniel. Dani's the loud one. Daniel's the one who refuses to give in. The mysterious shuffle of genetics and environment.

She wishes this could be over, and Jackie would go storming out -- again. She doesn't know why Ashmel proposed this attempt at reconciliation, except that the _Tok'ra_ are probably curious about the customs of human Christmas celebrations and biological families.

Well, this is undoubtedly a typical one.

"I'm surprised she gave him another thought. Really, Mom, when you came back here to Dad, why would you--"

"When Jack sent her back here."

There's something in Daniel's voice that stops Jackie in mid sentence, which is good, as Dani thinks she might cry in another minute, and she'd hate that. It's so unfair for her daughter to be a stranger. To have so much of the story and none of it. Yes, she loves Daniel dearly. She's known him … oh, it's hard to be sure with crossing dimensions, but she's been back in this one for 38 years now, and those years she's sure of. And seven years before that, most of them spent apart, and missing Daniel all the time they were parted.

But she loved Jack first. Loves him still and will love him always.

Love is forever.

"Jack sent your mother back here," Daniel tells his daughter. "She didn't want to come back. She didn't ask to come back. Jack shoved her through their quantum mirror. She slid halfway across the floor of my office, as I remember. If you want the truth, I think your Uncle Jack didn't tell you quite enough of it. Well, Jack was always like that. I wish I could thank him for it.

"The _Goa'uld_ had invaded her Earth. They were already in the SGC. They'd taken over the Stargate and the top levels of Cheyenne Mountain. The quantum mirror that led back to our SGC was the only way out, and because of Entropic Cascade Failure, your mother was the only one who could use it. The Mountain was on self-destruct, but the self-destruct might not have worked. That particular _Goa'uld_ , Anubis, really wanted to get his hands on her, and because she was Jack's Second In Command there, she knew all the details of the Resistance cells they'd set up offworld, so they couldn't let that happen. So Jack sent her back through the mirror."

It's a long explanation, and it still leaves a lot of things out. But no one needs to know them, and in a decade or two, no one will care. She thinks of being young -- even as young as she was on the day she last kissed Jack -- and her heart breaks a little. As for being as young as she was on the day she first saw him…

That world is as dead and buried as Classical Atlantis. It is almost half a century ago.

"But don't you _love_ Dad?" Jackie asks.

"Make up your mind," Charlie says reasonably.

"Yes, I love your father," Dani says firmly. "I love you, and I love Charlie. I'm sorry it never showed."

" _I_ knew, Mom," Charlie says. She smiles at him. He was a darling, but an easy baby. A second child. She'd already gone through all the clinging terrors of new motherhood with Jackie. Charlie had been Daniel's, somehow, right from the first. That was why Daniel had taken Ashmel so hard.

It still hurts him, she knows. God knows they're used to that.

"What about Jack?" Jackie demands.

"Jack is dead."

Jackie -- perhaps she ought to start thinking of her as Joanna -- looks as if she's just been handed something large and indigestible and told that it tastes like chicken. "Why would he lie to me?"

Jack-here, she means. Jack wouldn't lie to a child.

Daniel glances down at her. Still her turn. "He didn't lie to you. He just didn't tell you the whole truth."

"That's the same thing," Joanna says stubbornly.

She shifts her weight against Daniel. His turn.

"No," Daniel says. "It's different. You were -- what? -- when you went and asked him if he'd been sleeping with your mother?"

Phrased that way, the question's a little embarrassing. It's meant to be. Meant to sting.

"Twelve," Joanna says in a small voice.

Daniel relents and pats the empty seat beside him. Joanna sits down.

Dani can imagine the scene. Jack's incredulity and mortification at discussing sex and its byproducts with a small female child, especially one that he's known since she was in the womb. Her stubborn insistence that he _must_ be her real father because of what she's overheard. His desperate attempts to get out of the conversation unscathed, and, finally, with no other choice, explaining to Joanna just _how_ it is her Mom can be talking about the things she's talking about, but that it happened a long time ago, in a place where Daniel wasn't. With somebody else also named Jack O'Neill.

Daniel clears his throat, obviously trying very hard not to laugh. He manages, but she can't help it. The image is irresistible.

"You think this is _funny_?" Joanna demands, outraged.

"Well, actually, we do," Daniel says, without a trace of apology. "It's sort of an… SG-1 thing. Sorry."

Dani takes off her glasses and rubs her eyes. "Oh, the look that must have been on his face--!" she says with a trembling sigh.

"Payback," Daniel says without a trace of remorse. He squeezes Dani's arm. Then he returns to the subject at hand with the same persistence that used to drive Jack -- and half the people who knew Daniel -- absolutely crazy. "The information you got from Jack would have been a good start. It would have showed you there was something to look into. But you shouldn't have just stopped there. You could have asked Sam. Or me. Or even your mother."

"I knew everything I needed to know," Joanna says sullenly. She sounds hurt and angry, and Joanna has never really had much of a sense of humor to begin with, alas -- she's nothing like either Jack _or_ Daniel in that respect. Charlie's really got it all -- all of the sunniness of Daniel's temper with none of the darkness. What Joanna is, is stubborn. Oh, lord. Three generations of stubborn, from Daniel to Melburne all the way back to Great-grandfather Nicholas Ballard, and she has those genes on both sides.

"You thought you did," Daniel says. "Were you sure?"

"What does it matter whether Mom came back by herself or Uncle Jack's double sent her back?"

"You still feel left out," Daniel says. Neither agreeing nor disagreeing. Simply restating her position to make it clear.

"I don't _belong_ in this family! You're a genius, Mom's a genius, even stupid old Charlie's a genius, and now that he's got, um, our respected ally the _Tok'ra_ Ashmel in his head, he's even more a genius. I'm just a stick-monkey."

"So love is something you earn?" Daniel asks.

"You have to be good enough," Joanne says. As if this should be obvious.

_Not good enough. Never good enough._

Her oldest fear. How in god's name has she managed to pass it on to her daughter? She'd been so careful.

Guilt turns to anger before she can stop it. "Oh for crying out loud," Dani snaps, pushing herself to her feet. "You really _are_ bucking for idiot. You don't earn love. You get it because people are stupid, or aren't paying attention, or are feeling generous that day, or are nice. Do you think Kasuf adopted me because I'd _earned_ it? He mistook me for a god. Do you think Daniel loves me because I've _earned_ it? To this day I don't know why he does. I love him because he's everything admirable I am not, and because _he_ loves _me_. Because he's _worth_ loving, not because he's _earned_ it. I loved you before you were born. You'd done nothing to earn it, other than _be_. I loved you afterward, when you didn't do much more. And I still love you, although right now I really can't stand the sight of you."

" _Mom_!" Joanne says, startled.

"You actually deserve that one," Daniel tells his daughter gently.

"Don't 'Mom' me, Captain Jackson, I used to eat Captains for breakfast. I'm sorry you find life confusing, but I can't help you there. Goodnight Daniel, Charlie. Ashmel."

She has to get out of here before they see her cry.

#

When they moved in here they remodeled extensively. Two studies open off the bedroom upstairs, and two baths. The other bedrooms, now guest rooms, are downstairs. The whole second floor is their private space. After so many years of cramped quarters and military bases, true privacy's a luxury for such private people.

She goes into her study and settles herself on the window seat. She doesn't bother to turn on the lights. Her eyes ache. Her heart aches. There are no tears. Good.

How could Jackie -- Joanna -- feel herself unloved? They _had_ loved her. More than that, they'd adored her.

They'd been so careful to give her everything they didn't have. Parents. A home. Encouragement she could be … anything.

Well, look how _that's_ turned out. Her daughter works on the _Starship Enterprise_ , thinks she has a boring routine job, and is convinced she's an afterthought in her glamorous parents' lives.

They're in love, yes. But Joanna mistakes the bond of combat soldiers for the bonds of love, and there's really no way to explain the difference to her. Or that they share them both.

#

She's dozing off, unwilling to give up her splendid isolation and be soothed -- or scolded -- by Daniel. She's sure Joanna will be gone by morning. Noon at the latest. It may be years before they see her again, except in the increasingly-unlikely event their paths cross professionally. _Admit failure and let go._ But that's something she's never been able to do, even now when it's the wisest and least painful course, the one best for everyone.

There's movement in the room. Old instincts sleep, but they never die. Her head comes up with a jerk; she starts to move.

Joanna is standing there.

She's the last person Dani expected to see. Daniel come to drag her off to bed. Ashmel come to give her words of _Tok'ra_ encouragement. For that matter, even Charlie.

Not Joanna.

"I went for a walk. I came back. I want to talk to you."

"This is a first," Dani says.

"Don't make jokes," Joanna pleads. Or perhaps it's an order.

"All right. No jokes. What do you want to talk about?"

"You think I'm stupid. That's why you don't like me. I get that you love me. But you don't like me."

Okay, for saying something like that, stupidity might enter into Dani's assessment somewhere.

She considers the matter honestly. Joanna's polylingual, of course -- no choice there, when both her parents had spoken to her in a dozen languages from the cradle -- but she'd never loved languages the way her parents and her brother did. She never learned more than half-a-dozen, and with age, new ones came harder to her. The things that interested the rest of the Jackson family -- ancient cultures, alien cultures, the past -- were interests she outgrew. She'd started noticing boys, and dropped the rest. Despite which, there was no Boy, and Dani doesn't think there's one now, though she doubts Joanna would tell her if there was.

Her grades had always been excellent.

The Air Force Academy came as a surprise, even to Dani.

She'd graduated at the top of her class.

She hadn't wanted them to come to Graduation.

Jack had gone.

"No, you're not stupid," she tells her daughter at last. "You're just not wise. And it isn't you I don't like. It's what I see when I look at you. I see all the mistakes I made -- not in bringing you up, because, you know, that'd be too easy. Bigger ones. And I don't like being reminded of them. I'm not very wise myself. And because of that, once, maybe, I destroyed a universe."

Joanna isn't wise, but she's smart. "The one where you came from."

"Yes. You see, with all that going back and forth, I thought I knew how …our… future would play out. It turned out I didn't, and when I meddled, I made things worse. Maybe. And then… I almost let this one be destroyed, too."

"Mom?" Joanna actually sounds a little scared. They may have left out a lot of the truth in what they've told each other, but Dani's never told her daughter a flat-out lie. It's time for all the truth now. Or at least as much of it as she can remember after almost half a century.

"Baby, what I need to tell you now is classified. It's always going to be classified. Can you keep it a secret -- from everyone -- no matter who asks?"

"Yes, Mom." She's very serious, this perfect daughter of hers and Daniel's. No matter how much she and Joanna fight -- or will fight in the future -- Dani believes her. She takes a deep breath, settles her mind to begin.

"You remember how Daddy used to die a lot -- but he always came back -- and when he was dead, he was an Ascended Being who could see the future?" She used to tell them to Joanna when she was young, to keep her from worrying when Daniel was away on missions. Daddy would come back. Daddy always came back, no matter what might happen. She was such a serious little girl.

" _Mom_! Those were _bedtime stories_!" Joanna's outraged at what seems to be a trick.

"No. They were true. It was all true."

Joanna walks across the carpet and sits on the floor at her feet. Rests her head against Dani's knee. She hasn't done that in more than twenty years.

"Well, one of those times, when he was Ascended, he came to my world -- across universes, you know, because he was here and I was there, because SG-1 had sent me home again. He told us Anubis was coming to invade Earth. That was why my Jack thought of sending me back here, because we had plenty of advance warning of what was going to happen to us. Your Dad and I don't know why he warned us, because he knew at the time it wouldn't help us defeat Anubis, but we think he did it because there were some aliens called the Furlings here, in this world, and so I needed to come back. They were trying to give us gifts that wouldn't have been very good for us, and I was the only one who could make them stop. That's the reason I came back. Not …just to be with him."

"Why you? You weren't from here."

Dani reaches out to stroke her daughter's hair. "Well, this is only the end of the story, really. For the whole thing, I have to start at the beginning."

And so she does. She tells the whole tale from the beginning. The very beginning. Meeting Catherine Langford. Joining the Stargate Program. Abydos. Sha're. Skaara. SG-1. Going to PHX-1138, to the alternate universe, home, back to the alternate universe that's been home since before Joanna was born.

It takes a while.

"…so in the end we managed to make the Furlings go away. Not forever, but for a hundred thousand years, which is a pretty long time. Maybe long enough. But I was pretty sure I was going to be shot for what I'd done, or at least imprisoned for life, and Daniel would probably go to prison for a long time, so we just … left."

"You _ran away?_ " Joanna sounds scandalized and interested at the idea her parents would do something like that. Something …unheroic.

"Yep. We didn't know then your Uncle Jack was arranging pardons for both of us. It was three years before he managed to catch up to us to tell us, and by then you were on the way. That was the main reason we got back in touch with the SGC. We'd wanted to have you, and we couldn't keep running with a family -- at least, not while you were very small. We thought they might let us go if we told them what we knew. Instead, they asked us back."

They sit in silence for a while.

"It's all true?" Joanna says.

"'He has woven well, and all truth,'" Dani answers. "Yes. It's true. I've probably forgotten a few things, but everything I've told you is true."

"It wasn't what I thought," Joanna says. She sounds irritated, mostly.

"Is it ever?" Dani asks. Nothing in _her_ life has gone the way she'd thought it would. For one thing, she's still alive. Long odds against that, back in the 20th Century. Or the first decade or so of the 21st.

"Were you ever scared?" Joanna asks. As if she's just now, finally, taking the leap of imagination that allows her to see her mother as a person similar to herself. It's not the way children ever see their parents, of course. Parents are icons.

"At the SGC? Going through the Gate? Sweetheart, most of the time I was terrified," Dani assures her fervently. "And some of the time I wasn't quite sure what I was doing. The only trick to that is not to let anybody else know."

"You're kidding," Joanna says in disbelief.

Dani makes an amused sound. "If you only knew how many times I heard 'don't touch that' just after I'd touched something." Mostly from Jack. She pushes up her glasses and rubs her eyes. It's been a long night, and a lot of old ghosts have been awakened. "Somehow it all worked out. We survived, and so did Earth. That's as much as anyone can ask."

Joanna gets to her feet and bends over to kiss Dani on the cheek. Yawns. Checks her watch. "Oh, wow, look at the time. I'd better let you get to bed." She walks to the hallway door and stops. "Do you still love him?"

Dani knows who she means.

"Ask your father about Sha're sometime."

Joanna makes an amused 'Hmph' and walks out into the hall. Closes the door behind her softly.

#

Daniel's sitting up reading when Dani comes into the bedroom. His bifocals gleam in the bedside light. "I didn't hear any screaming," he says, setting aside his book.

"We talked. I think I violated most of the National Security Act." She goes into her bathroom to change for bed.

Afterward, she snuggles up next to Daniel -- always her favorite part of the day -- and he turns out the light. "What time's it?" she asks.

"After two."

"I am going to be so dead tomorrow."

"Nobody does anything the day after Christmas. We can sleep in." He kisses her cheek. Now she is kissed on both cheeks. "Mmm… _which_ part of the National Security Act did you violate?"

"I told her about the Furlings."

Daniel laughs, just a little. "They're going to shoot both of us."

"Have to catch us first," she says, settling herself for sleep.

#

It's not the end of the trouble with Joanna, of course. They're old wounds, and they run deep. But it's the beginning of the end. And if years of Could Have Been have been lost to them both, then Dani's still had the best of her daughter, her childhood. And no matter what Joanna thinks -- or may think -- she hasn't had the most terrible adolescence on record, the one most deprived of love and haven.

She was not raised in the court of a _Goa'uld_ System Lord.

 _The thing we most wish to give our children is illusions_ , Dani thinks to herself, and takes a strange comfort from the knowledge that her daughter believes she had a terrible adolescence. It means, in the end, that she did her job, and kept, as she keeps from a thirty-five-year-old Air Force Officer, the knowledge of what a dark and terrible place the universe can be. Bleak to the point of madness, of despair.

_I did it, Jack. I took care of the kid._

The day's coming when the kid will have to take care of herself. Not this year, not next year, but some day not all that far away. Ashmel will keep an eye on her, of course.

Dani's made him promise.

#

GEORGETOWN, 2063:

He's dozing in his chair when Jack walks out of the kitchen with a beer.

He wonders where Jack got it. The doctors haven't let Dani have beer for years. Or Scotch, for that matter. She sneaks them both into the house anyway, even though they don't do her ulcer any good. He throws them out. It's a game they play. One of many.

"Indy around?"

"I think she's upstairs." He sits up, retrieves his glasses -- they've fallen into his lap. Thank god they're not the bifocals. He always hated those. A compromise, like so many of the things in his life.

Jack looks absurdly young.

"Indiana!" Jack shouts toward the stairs. "We are _late_!"

#

She really ought to go to bed, but it's lonely without Daniel to share it. She can't bear to wake up at night and hear the silence. She sits in the chair in the corner of her bedroom -- hers alone now -- one hand on her cane. She'll need it when she eventually decides to get up.

She'd thought they'd die together. Genetic twins. Same genetic clock. But women live longer than men. Daniel died two years ago. Peacefully. In his sleep.

She would have given long odds against that for either of them sixty years ago. No matter what Cassandra once told them when they accidentally tumbled -- separately, each in their own universe -- into their own far future.

She still consults occasionally with the government every now and then.

She has grandchildren. Joanna finally married, though of course Charlie never will. He and Ashmel have promised to keep an eye on the family, and will be able to do so for centuries to come. It's easier since the _Tok'ra_ can visit Earth openly.

It's been a long life. A good life. She has no regrets.

 _"Indiana! We are_ late _!"_

She springs to her feet at the sound of the familiar voice and takes the steps down to the living room three at a time.

Jack and Daniel are waiting for her.

"Late again," Jack says, glancing at his watch. "How did you ever manage to keep her in line, Danny?"

Daniel grins. "I never did."

She hugs Jack -- hard -- and reaches out an arm to pull Daniel in too. And then his arms are around her and the grieving pain she's lived with every minute of his absence is gone. Her other half has been restored to her and she can breathe again.

And Jack…

He smiles down at her, and the long tangled dream is over at last. She's lived with the mortal wound of his absence for two thirds of her life; now it's gone as if it had never been.

She doesn't know which of them she's missed more.

It doesn't really matter. She isn't complete without both of them.

_Once upon a time there was a woman who…_

Over now.

Both her men. Here at last.

She steps back. Looks at them expectantly.

"Come on, kids. Stargate's waiting. You know how much it costs to keep the lights turned on around here."

She tucks her arm through Daniel's. Takes Jack's hand.

"Where're we going?"

"Out there," Jack says. "Thataway."

#

When they step through the Stargate, they're on Kheb, and in uniform once more. The old uniform of the SGC, that hasn't existed for half a century at least. It doesn't matter. The reality to which this belongs -- and it _is_ a reality -- doesn't need to take cognizance of Time.

Everything's here, just as she remembers it. Pack, vest, gun, knife. She has her quarterstaff. Daniel never carried one on missions.

She and Daniel follow Jack, in the way they always have.

It's a familiar path, at least for two of them, and Jack seems to know where he's going. They don't speak. Too many questions? Or none? This is Kheb, after all: the Jaffa paradise. In a sense, not an expected destination for any of them.

It's spring here, and morning. She's already forgotten what season it was on Earth. Doesn't matter anyway. She isn't going back.

None of them are.

#

They approach the temple. There's a figure standing in the outer courtyard doorway; a woman.

Daniel starts to run.

She takes an off-balance step, suddenly recognizing the woman. _Sha're._ Jack puts a hand on her arm, keeping her from following.

She feels a pang of jealousy. _Her_ Daniel.

But Sha're is her sister.

She sees them meet. Embrace.

She takes Jack's hand for a moment, but it was never something they did -- certainly never offworld like this -- and she quickly lets go. He squeezes her hand before she does, though.

They walk on to greet the others.

#

It's awkward, but only for a moment. Sha're turns from Daniel to her, puts her arms around Dani in a fierce embrace. _" <Dana're, I was right all along. He did wish to court you!>"_ she whispers in Dani's ear triumphantly.

True, though none of them knew it at the time. And she married Sha're's husband … instead.

"She says she's happy to see us," Dani says, for Jack's benefit.

Daniel looks … radiant.

The first time she ever saw him, Sha're had been dead for five years. Taken by Apophis for Amonet eight years before. The first time Daniel saw her, she had killed her sister five years before.

And Jack was newly dead.

For the first time.

 _" <I shall tell him what I truly said,>"_ Sha're teases. Dani remembers Sha're always understood English better than she spoke it, but she speaks it well enough.

Daniel puts his arm around Sha're, drawing her close again, and smiles at Dani. He's heard most of the conversation and can guess the rest. Sha're turns in Daniel's arms and kisses him again.

He's so happy.

The two of them, he and she, have had moments and hours of such happiness, but they always knew how quickly it could be taken away. Theirs was a quieter kind, the product of two children, the lessons of age, and decades together. If, in any moment of that time, she could have given him this joy as a gift, she would have.

Jack puts an arm around her shoulder. It's a gesture familiar from many worlds. She leans into him, looks up. He smiles down at her. Living and dead, he's been her touchstone since she was 25 years old.

Hers again now.

She's entirely spellbound, and for this moment, so is he. She turns slightly toward him, puts her free hand on his chest. Looking at him. Nothing more.

"I, uh, hey, guys, we've got to… Don't we have to… Be somewhere?"

Daniel. Sounding almost flustered. No, definitely flustered. Though whether by Sha're or by her, she isn't sure. From the tone of his voice, though, he's been trying to get their attention for a while. She looks away from Jack, looks at Daniel. He smiles, telling her all she needs to know. She knows him so well. A lifetime's worth of knowledge.

"The mountains," Jack says. He sounds calm. Certain. "Should be able to make them by nightfall."

Not back to the Stargate then. Interesting. It doesn't matter to her where she is or goes if she's with Jack and Daniel, and Daniel is with Sha're. It's good, too, to be with her sister again. Forgiven, at last, for the only killing she committed that ever really mattered to her.

They leave the temple, never having gone inside, and walk on.

#

In the mountains, there is forever in a day. Many days, perhaps. Long enough to heal all wounds. But this is not a place to stay forever. They know that, too.

There is one more place to go.

And so, at last, there's another temple. A set of pillars, really, a deep portico screening an interior wall. She and Daniel walk inside.

"Always comes down to this, doesn't it?" Jack asks nobody in particular, sitting down on a rock to watch the two of them work. He doesn't tell them to be careful. They've learned that lesson by now, as well as either of them ever will.

Sha're sits beside him.

#

It's complicated.

Four portals -- deep archways set into the wall -- are surrounded by dozens -- more -- of tiny jewels. Each jewel is a switch, pressed down to activate it. Each switch is labeled. Not in English, of course. That would be too easy. The portals can be linked in a dozen ways, but that's only the beginning. There are other specifications you can make. Some are global -- applying to all four archways. Some applying to one, or two, or three. Some are mutually exclusive: you can't select one condition and also select another. There's a way to select gender, for example, but you cannot select both 'male' and 'female.' Others override for more mysterious reasons. With enormous trouble, they've deciphered a series of symbols that seem to relate to 'caste' and another series that are certainly 'destination.' Both sets cannot be selected at once.

"Either a king, _or_ in Babylon, I guess," Daniel says.

"Babylon, I think," she says.

He reaches up -- the jewels are small, because there are so many -- and presses the ones for 'Earth' over all four portals. There was another choice they could have made.

They didn't consider it.

#

It takes a long time. It's like programming a computer, not really one of their skills. They have to start over several times, having selected a variable that re-sets things they care about.

Remember everything they know now? Forget? Oddly, the choice is offered. But it's linked to another: the probability they'll meet again. The more they choose to remember, the less likely that becomes. These keys are sliders, not buttons. She looks at Daniel, questioningly. Love -- that's never in doubt -- without knowing why? Or know everything, including what they've lost and will never have again? Not much of a choice, really, if you put it in those terms.

He nods. One by one, they set the switches for 'Meet' at 100% probability. But the switches rock back, just a little. There are no certainties, she guesses. Just probabilities.

And the switches for 'Know,' have set themselves forward. More than the equivalent little. Enough, perhaps, that they'll feel … destined … to be together when they meet.

She wonders if all this has happened before. How many times have they stood here? Together, alone? What settings, what conditionals, could have produced the lives they've just led? She truly can't imagine it. Some malfunction in the portals? Or is this the first time they've ever been here?

They go on. So many choices have yet to be made.

Time and place? On the knees of the gods. Choosing them unlinks the portals, and they won't have that. It doesn't matter. Whatever happens, the four of them will be together.

But in what way? They're allowed, they discover, to specify their relationships, and there are a lot of possibilities offered. They cannot keep what they have now; just charting it's simply mind-bending. They work it out first on paper, then discuss several compromises before coming up with one they think will work, before they dare to think of touching the machine at all. They don't want to lose the work they've already put in.

Jack, her husband. Sha're, Daniel's wife. She and Daniel…

Brother and sister.

Sha're becomes her sister again when Sha're marries Daniel, and Jack and Daniel become brothers at last when Dani marries Jack. She and Daniel never have a chance to miss each other, because they are born together.

Born together.

It's time to admit what this machine is for.

"Almost through?" Jack walks in, looking around. Faintly curious, mostly bored. A little impatient. Sha're follows him, less interested in the temple than in Daniel.

It's time to go.

"Just about. _Don't touch anything_ ," Daniel says, interposing himself hastily between Jack and the wall of …their future.

She gets to her feet, presses the last buttons. Husband, wife, brother, sister. Steps back. The archways fill with veils of light. There's a hum of power, of intention.

"Now what?" Jack asks.

"We… walk through," she says. "You're here." She shows him to the archway at the far left.

"It says something about fishing on there, right?" he says, looking at the wall of jewels beside the archway, some lit, some dark, all set off by rows of alien symbols. "And beer?"

"And me," she says. "Jack, I'll be there, somewhere. Look for me. Find me." She feels a momentary surge of panic. The world is wide. Where will he be? Where will she?

"I always do," he says. He stops on the threshold, brushes her hair back and kisses her gently on the forehead. Steps through. Vanishes.

But not gone. She will see him again, on the Other Side.

"And you're here," Daniel says to Sha're, leading her to the archway at the far right. "Don't worry. No matter what happens, I will come for you. We'll be together."

 _" <I will wait for you, Dan'yel-my-husband. Forever.>"_ Sha're kisses him as if it's the last time she ever will. And steps through.

Now she and Daniel are alone.

"Not goodbye, you know. Not even for a while," he says.

She nods, her eyes heavy with tears. But he will be her brother -- truly and completely now. And she's no Drusilla, to play a Roman Empress's games with a brother. She puts her arms around him, and kisses him. Because it _is_ the last time she ever will. He holds her as tightly as she holds him.

_Goodbye, Daniel. Goodbye, my love._

A sleep and a forgetting.

When she looks up, his eyes are wet as well. He knows as well as she what they're giving up. But there's no way to have both.

And they will still be together.

They walk to their portals hand-in-hand, holding hands until the very last moment, when the stone itself pulls them apart.

#

_GIZA, 1930:_

_His name is Nicholas Melburne Johnstone III. He has a Double First in Classics from Oxford, where he earned the nickname 'Daniel' from spending a great deal of time in the lion's den -- a natural consequence of being brash, brilliant, and very young. He has a twin sister, Nicola; she's named, as he is, after their paternal grandfather, the rich eccentric who's funding Nicholas and Nicola's Grand Tour._

_Their long-suffering parents hope Nicola -- known to her friends as Nicks -- will find something suitable in the husband or at least fiancé line among the rich English fellow-travelers out here. Certainly pickings have been slim at home, and they really don't like the class of young man they see about since the War. Thank god Nicholas was only a baby then. The twins were born in July of 1910, just before the summer's day was done and Hell came to Earth._

_

#

_

_"Danny, who's that?"_

_"It's 'Daniel' if you must use that absurd nickname at all."_

_"Don't be a bear, Danny; I know it's hot. Over there. At the edge of the bazaar. See him? He's watching us."_

_"For heaven's sake, Nicks. Some American. Do you think I know every American in Egypt?"_

_"You have a lot of odd friends."_

_"I don't."_

_"You do."_

_"How would you know?"_

_"I follow you when you leave the hotel at night."_

_"Damn and blast--"_

_"If Father knew that you were swearing in front of me, he'd stop your allowance."_

_"If Father knew you were wandering the streets at night, he'd do more than stop yours."_

_"Threats, threats. Give me a cigarette, Danny?"_

_"If I do, do you promise to stop sneaking out of the hotel at night?"_

_"Of course not."_

_"Someone needs to beat you."_

_"I'd like to see the man who could. Oh do give me a cigarette, brother dear. Don't be vile."_

_

#

_

_His name is Jonathan Nielsen. His friends -- the few he has left -- call him Jack._

_Born and raised in Chicago, USA. Hasn't seen the old homestead lately._

_He's a pilot. Flew in the Lafayette Escadrille in the War. Since then? Call him a soldier of fortune. Owns his own plane. For the moment. That won't last if he doesn't find work soon. 'Fortune' is a lousy paymaster._

_He leans against the wall, watching the boy and girl bicker. Standing in the middle of the Bazaar, blocking traffic. Not bothering to keep their voices down. Just like the English everywhere. Lords of Creation. Their officers, most of them, gave him a swift pain._

_They're twins, he realizes. They ought to be more careful. There are places even now where a set of fair-skinned twins will fetch a very high price, and nobody will much care about British retribution. And the girl is pretty._

_None of them knows it yet, but they're about to embark on the adventure of a lifetime._

###

**Author's Note:**

> So I suck at endings, okay? I currently deal with this problem by not finishing anything, but back in 2005 I was not that smart. And so while I reached a good ending point on "A Mirror For Observers" (actually, I reached several, and the one posted here is just kind of random), I didn't stop writing.
> 
> And writing.
> 
> And writing.
> 
> And in the process I committed Babyfic, Kidfic, Curtainfic, Futurefic, Ghosts, and Reincarnation. Yeah, I know, I'm an overachiever. 
> 
> The really scary thing is: _I can still tell you WHAT HAPPENS NEXT._


End file.
